War at Sea- a Kancolle Story
by DarkestVampire
Summary: Lt. Commander Yamamoto had been thrown into a world of war, chaos and... love, as he was assigned to his first post to command the newly repurposed Takagi Elementary School, now known as Okinawa Bay Naval Base. Stuck inbetween various shipgirls, he was about to find out the devil was not as black as he was painted. Rating changed for future content, various pairings.
1. Prolog- a brief history of the Abyss

**Prolog**

I was twelve when it happened.

* * *

„USS Benson, this is JDS Kirishima, copy."

„Benson, we read you loud and clear, Kirishima."

„All green, repeat, all green. Ready to commence maneuvers."

„Roger that, Kirishima. Assuming position."

DDG-174, Kirishima, a destroyer of the Kongo-class. Armed with missiles, a five inch gun, AEGIS system and Phalanx AA guns... compared to its namesake, nothing more than small fry, an escort for carriers, a patrol. Yet, it carried ballistic missiles- warheads capable of reaching targets hundreds of miles ahead. Modern warfare.  
Amongst its crew of 300 men was one in preticular- Taro Yamamoto, Staff sargeant, responsible for the AEGIS weapon systems. When the fateful hour came, he was amongst the men in the bunker- as they called the weapons array. A steel framed, reinforced square filled with computers, cameras, high tech equipment- the guns were controlled with joysticks rather than wheels and turntables, everything possible was automated- the lights were lowered, the siren called for medium attention. They were going hot.

„Sageru, arm the missiles. First order of the day is to attack target drones fifty miles southwest." Taro ordered, leaning onto one of the steel bars seperating two booths with computer operators.

„And make sure you hit them straight in the center. We wouldn´t want to embarress ourselves in front of the americans."  
„Aye aye, sir!" Sageru, a lanky, tanned man grinned and gave him a mock salute, before getting on it.  
„Think we`re gonna win this, Yamamoto?" A voice from the side called out to him, a paler, but more built woman, wearing the uniform of a gunnery officer and bearing the ear protectors to boot.  
„Damn right we will. Afterall, seventy-and-a-few years ago, another Kirishima blasted Americans out of the water." Taro chuckled, getting off the steel frame and standing up right again. „Why should this be a different case?"  
For the next few minutes, after some grins and chuckles all around, there was silence- occasionally some data was called out, but all in all, they were busy at work, and Taro was overlooking the lot of them... until he spotted something he didn´t like.  
„Fukari... how many times has it been now, hmm?" He turned over to the balding middle aged man, looking tiredly away into the room, rather than onto his viewscreen. „If you`re in the middle of combat, DONT neglect your duty! Get back on those monitors!"  
„Alright, alright..! Subs aren´t part of this operation, why would i need to-"  
The words died in his throat as he looked at the monitor, and detected five blips approaching fast.  
„S-sir! A torpedo attack! We´re being-"  
His words were overshadowed by a sharp tilt of the boat, a loud bang and a lick of heat seeping into the room.

„Battlestations! Battlestations, abandon the mission! Prepare depth charges!" Taro yelled into the room, but rather than compliance, another sharp hit rocked the boat, and a piece of steel was blown off the hinges, smacking the man next to him, Sageru, in the face like a shotgun slug. Needless to say, he was out of commission, while a flame came out of the hole it had made, a gas leak.  
„Sir, our hull has been breached, twice!" The man known as Takashin yelled into the room, ducking away as a followup explosion, not as sharp as before, kicked them hard... possibly a warning shot to whatever was out there. „We`re listing already!"  
„Abandon ship! Abandon ship right now!" Taro yelled, pulling the unconcious Sageru off of his seat, and grabbing the radio that was in front of him. „USS Benson, this is JDS Kirishima, do you read? USS Benson, do you read!?"  
No answer. The Benson was their target, afterall, they had probably changed frequencies.  
„Benson, this is an emergancy! We`ve been hit by multiple-"  
Another sharp hit, followed by a second, and the armor encased bunker broke apart as a tidal wave rushed inside, steel flying across the room, screams echoing in the steel deathtrap while people tried to get up the ladders. Taro was hit by a chair that had broken loose, crippling his leg as he fell to the floor, back down into the icy cold water.  
„.Gaahhh...! ...Shit.. this is how it... ends, huh? Well... Its a burial at sea for me, then..."  
The water was rising quickly, the steel supports breaking apart and letting more and more inside.  
„Shichiro... do your best out there... for me... I´ll see you in another..."  
Water filled his mouth, and he stopped to talk... through the dark of the sea that streamed inside, he saw something black enter through the hole in the bunker. A cigar shaped, self propelled, black stick, half the size of a human...  
The cold water and lack of air claimed his conciousness, but before he passed out entirely, he could feel the pressure blow his heart into a pancake as it hit the wall.  
Behind that wall was the missile silo, and a second later, DDG-174 Kirishima went up in a ball of fire.

USS Benson, HMS Masterful, JDS Kongo, JDS Hyuuga... were annhilated by this point, bitten apart, blown to bits by steel whales leaping out of the sea, firing at them with guns installed into their bodies, or gnawing into them with teeth harder than steel. The few shells they managed to give off landed somewhere in the ocean, unable to train guns on the tiny, fast moving vessels in time.

* * *

I was twelve when it happened. 27th of July, 2016. Zero hour of the war against the Abyssal fleet.

In the next two weeks, 36 ships were lost, fifteen of those japanese. As it turned out, the fleet that attacked Kirishima and the others were no better than scouts, a few small, lightly armed vessels... the bigger ones, the size of humans, but boasting the firepower of a fleet... one managed to sink the USS Gerald R. Ford, the biggest, most powerful warship of her time, and among the biggest carriers ever built. It was about that point where the world acknowledged the threat these beings were to them.  
Jet aircraft only had a marginal effect on them... while they were fast enough to engage, even the jets were huge targets to the tiny Abyssal ships, which resembled humans more than the average soldier would´ve hoped for. Survivors spoke of pale women, their flesh merged with cannons and torpedos, glowing red eyes and black horns making them seem like demons of the damned.  
They weren`t far off. We never recieved communications, demands, a declaration of war, even though the Abyssals were smarter than any of us expected. After a series of hopeless battles for survival, we managed to critically damage one near the coast, and it was brought back for a study... which gave off a frightening advance in technology.

The beings we faced were machines, robots... but intelligent ones. Not just programmed to do the bidding of their masters- they were a sentinent machine race, capable of answering questions and asking them, although.. they didn´t have much to talk about with us.  
While the Abyss were the unchallanged masters of naval warfare, they quickly lost their advantages when they came to land- tanks, bombers, artillary fire and even infantry quickly took out whatever made it to shore- as fast and nimble as they were at sea, on solid ground, they barely moved any faster than a normal human.

After the capture of a few more, the scientists accidentally created something they hadn`t anticipated- a memory backup of the Abyssal ship, formed into a tiny humanoid body of misshapened proportions. They dubbed them „Faries", and since then used them to harness the combined knowledge of their own and that of the Abyss to retro-engineer the Abyssal ships.  
Using plans of battleships used in the past, the mighty, fearsome machines of death built in World War II and before, the Faries built the human variant of an Abyssal ship- known as the Shipgirl.  
Intelligent, competent, devoted to their mission, they were given the memories and combat experiences of the namesake ships that were used in their design... and although science cannot explain the exact technique the fairies use to create... life from lifelessness, the shipgirls quickly became more of a species of their own than a weapon. Girls made of organic steel, bleeding, breathing beings that had their own thoughts and opinions, even feelings, desires and needs. While their physiology gave them superior strength and the ability to live without food, their bodies required fuel to operate- fuel refined out of hydrogen and liquified methane worked fine. Their only real nourishment was steel, which their bodies used to replace broken and damaged parts from within and renewed aging components... essentially, if treated well, they would live just as long as their namesakes would. Outfitted with downsized, but high powered guns, torpedos, and planes operated by faries, they lived up to their names, as well.

With these weapons at our disposal, we finally had our first victories. Four long years of dedicated fighting had perfected the shipgirl to the point where we could change over from the defense into the offense... but for two years, this „Offense" has had no effect... either there were an infinite supply of Abyssals under the sea, which would likely mean the end for us all on a long term, or they just kept coming back...

I would find out, sooner or later, i thought to myself, as i stared at the repurposed school that had been turned into a naval base.

Lieutenant Commander Shichiro Yamamoto is my name. And together with the shipgirls, i will bring an end to this war.


	2. The first day at the office

My first impression was a mixed feeling... from the overall look, one wouldn´t notice the origin of this place- the paper doors had been replaced with more sturdy ones, the whole appearance of the school was higher quality, higher durability, higher.. survivability. Afterall, people could bomb this place, or shell it from the coast. Still, from the layout and the look from the outside, you could tell it used to be a place where little kids learned their vocabulary, studied ancient rome, solved math problems. Now, the gym hall had been replaced with a factory, complete with forge and machinary to build and repair shipgirls. The pool was kept intact, probably for the fitness and overall excersize of the ships, in the back yard, a ramp was heading down the bay into the water, fitted with a steam pressured catapult to start the ships with a bit of speed.

The headmasters office... renamed the Admirals office was my destination. Opening the door i didn`t expect much, but... what i found inside was rather nice, actually. Just what you´d expect an office to look like, with a large open window, parquet floors (At least i think they were, could be a cheap chinese plastic imitation) a nice, small desk, a couple of drawers, and near the door, a small cupboard with a Taisho sword on a display stand... i was expecting that, the martialistic nature of a wartime interior design.

While the office itself was very nice, although a bit plain, i couldn´t help but notice the young girl already there, waiting for me… her appearance was a bit odd. Short, with black hair in a bobcut, thickened eyebrows and big puppydog eyes, her entire body seemed.. small, in every respect- short limbs, short torso, small hips and shoulders, virtually no chest whatsoever, like a midget, which made her head look bigger than it was. Oddly, the pale girl was dressed in a white swimsuit that resembled those worn in swimming classes, with a Kanji written on it in red bold letters- her name, likely. Finally, to finish the odd look, she wore diving goggles and a snorkel, as if… she didn´t really know how to swim.

"C-commander, Sir! …I. I mean Admiral! Yes, Admiral. I am the Type-3 submerged transport vehicle, Maruyu, and i´ve been assigned to work with you…!" Maruyu looked at my face for a few moments while I was stunned by her…. Timid appearance and equally quiet voice. That wasn´t what I expected a Shipgirl to be like. "…..oh dear, you… haven´t heard of it?"

"Huh? Sorry, heard of what? I was distracted for a moment… that Kanji on your chest is a bit hard to decipher." I made up this excuse, before giving her a salute in return. "Lieutenant Commander Shichiro Yamamoto, designated to lead this naval base… so, its actually neither, Maruyu, i`m no Admiral yet."  
"A-ah… but, you are our commander, like an Admiral, so… its shorter than Lieutenant Commander, too!" Maruyu insisted, and while I lowered my hand I felt like giving up, not really caring about it. Afterall, being called an Admiral felt… nice. Rewarding, even.  
"…Well, fine, call me Admiral, but in return, I get to call you Maru, okay?" Grinning, I made my way to the desk without giving her time to protest, but she still gave some as I sat down.  
"Maru?! But… but my name is Maruyu.. ….mmmmmm. So long as you`re not calling me a mole, I guess its fine…" Slowly, a smile perked up in her face also, while I got used to my new seat… or I tried to. It turned out to be harder than expected.

"So, Maru, who else is assigned here? I didn´t see anybody coming in." As I asked this, Maruyu once again turned pale.  
"A…aahh, you haven´t heard… uhm… well. Maruyu is the only one here so far… they left us some resources and supplies, but they´re barely enough to build a ship…" That turned out to be only the pinnacle of the iceberg, as I would later find out, but I already suspected this could be part of the reason why they assigned me, a newbie, to this base.

"…Oh, right then. I suppose our first step would be to aquire more…" Once those words left my mouth, a fairy hopped onto the desk and two others rolled out a map, while old, it displayed our current position and the surrounding seas and islands just fine. Some locations were marked, such as other naval bases (If they still existed, given the age of this map), fuel refinearies and mining plants.  
Seemed like I would only have to plot a course…

"Oh yeah, before I forget… Maru, you`re a transport ship, right? Isn`t it too dangerous for you to cross Abyss infested waters?" Wrong question, she turned a bit gloomy after that.

"M-Maruyu is capable of fighting…! … a little…" She swallowed, and one of the faries brought me a spreadsheet, showing Maruyu´s statistics- combat effectiveness, diving depth, range, speed, et cetera. I very nearly avoided yelping out when I noticed her combat effectiveness was nearly nonexistent, and she could dive… about as well as a human, really. Not quite the impressive submarine. This was my first ship, huh. Damn Admirality Board.  
"Well, this calls for a change of tactics, then. Rather than taking the direct route… we`ll be making a few detours, disgusing our position here, and here." Marking a few spots on the map, I took a pencil away from one of the faries, scared she´d stab herself in the face playing with the writing tool that was the same size as her body. Her cheeks then puffed up, and she pouted, sitting on a pencil eraser instead.

"A-ah… you really trust this to Maruyu?" The submarine looked at me with a beaming expression, but also a bit of fright. Inside me, the wish to get rid that fear bubbled up, and I reached out to touch that small shoulder of hers. She twitched briefly, as if scared I would break it, but I merely gave her a pat.  
"You won´t be alone. I`ll come along."  
"…Wh-wha-what?!"  
"I won´t leave you alone out there, Maru. I`ll come along in a boat and help you out."  
"Bu.. but that's…! Too dangerous, Admiral!"  
I smirked to her, patting her once again. She was… cute, in a way, and I could see myself grow fond of this little submarine.  
"Don´t worry so much about me, Maru. I can fight for myself, and the boats have guns on them, too… still, if it all works out we won´t even see an Abyssal ship." I looked deep into her eyes, curling up a fist around the pencil. "Do you trust me? I trust you. If you trust me… then we`ll make it through there without a hitch."  
It took a few moments, but… Maruyu nodded, and gave off a faint smile. As it seemed, she was trusting me… slowly, but surely. Giving her an affirmative nod, I stood up and grabbed the Taisho sword that was on display near the door. While it was highly unlikely Abyssals would allow me to whack them with that sword, it was… more of a gesture than anything else.  
"Lets go then…! We`ll be back before the Abyss even sees us coming!"

As it turned out, they HAD seen us, but at least it was merely a scouting party…. Three faint black spots in the ocean, chasing us for a while, but eventually pulling away , leaving us be as we were likely unattractive targets to them. Beginners luck.  
Maruyu was still shivering all over when we returned from our four-hour round trip, and I had her sit down in the office while faries started unloading the boat… and Maruyu´s comically small container she kept cargo in, until one handed me a checklist with the lot we had secured. It wasn`t that much, but… it would allow for a ship to be built, barely. That's what it was all about- with two ships, we´d be able to gather twice as much, and then we had three, four, five, and soon enough we´d have this base up and running.

Maruyu was still shivering.  
"Admiral… that was really scary, the way they kept following us… Maruyu was expecting them to start firing at any second…"  
I had to agree. I had been on the edge of my seat, too, seeing myself faced with certain doom so soon after the employment to the naval base, but… while I blamed it on trusting Maruyu that we survived, it was likely just dumb luck.  
"I`ve never seen them up close either… It was pretty scary, yeah." Sitting down again, I went over a chart of options for ship construction, before telling the fairy wearing a yellow hardhat to start producing one. Hopefully it would be good. "Its about time we start getting some firepower, though. We`re not going to win a war, hiding behind reefs and shallow sea. Still… I think you and me will have a lot of work to do in the coming weeks, Maru." I grinned at her, and she gave me an expression I couldn´t read. Something between being scared, looking forward to it and… blushing. Really, that girl… wasn´t a warship, not even close. She felt more like a person than a hulk of steel.

I could get used to that, I thought.


	3. The tough, the timid and the Admiral

„Commander?"

„Its Admiral, Maru. Whats up?"

The cute, round face of the submarine looked at me questioningly, before raising her voice again.

"You didn`t even eat anything for dinner yesterday…" Oh, right. Guess I forgot… after that round trip to get resources, I just did the paperwork and fell straight into my bed.

"Y-yeah, I guess." I admitted, getting up briefly to pull the curtains of my office window, letting some orange rays coming from the morning sun inside. Dawn broke over Okinawa, and it was quite the pretty sight for someone who lacked sleep. Despite passing out almost instantly after getting into my room, it felt like I hadn`t slept at all.

"Uhm… it's the job of your secretary ship to make you food, you know. So… if you want anything, you just have to assign one of us for kitchen duty…" Maruyu responded, still a bit shy about the topic for some reason. Perhaps she couldn`t cook very well… either way, I wouldn´t mind it right now.

"Ah, yeah, well… for now, could you do that? I don´t mean to judge a book by its cover, but Tenryuu doesn`t look like the ideal housewife."

Ah yes, Tenryuu. The result of our ship-building-experiment the day before. Bauxite, steel and fuel formed a purple haired girl about the same height as me in a process the fairies just didn`t let me watch, with one yellow eye and an eyepatch on the other… which made me wonder, since she had just been born. Why did she have a bad eye already?

Either way, the difference between Maruyu and Tenryuu was astronomic. While Maruyu was small, timid and shy, Tenryuu`s barsh, impulsive and outgoing behavior, along with her… quite attractive form was a stark contrast to the submarine. She was a light cruiser, carrying singlebarrel guns and torpedos, as well as a sword for reasons I couldn´t fanthom. Perhaps it made more sense on the battlefield to carry close range armament as well… which would explain the strange, trapez-shaped things sticking out from her boots. I thought they were rudders the first time I had seen them, but they would have no point in front like this. Perhaps they were breakwater, but then again, no other shipgirl I had seen so far had any, and the Tenryuu class wasn´t fameous for it either… so the last thing I could think of was some sort of close ranged weapon for kicking people.

Finally, and that was her most prominent feature aside from the eye- Tenryuu´s head featured two articulated... horns, I guess you could call them. She got mad at me when I called them ears before, and then showed me human ears below them… did the fairies know anything about effective design? Probably not, or else the would`ve just given her earbuds or something… not that I was complaining, the girl was a beauty, just… loud.

But back to Maru´s antics.

"W-well… yes… I can.." She answered my question regarding breakfast, fidgeting a bit. "I`ve… never done it before, but…" Geez. The way she was talking you´d think she was talking about her virginity.

"Its going to be fine, Maru." I assured her, patting her head with a smile. "Even if its not perfect the first time around, i´ll still eat it just the same if -you- made it." Some extra reassurance for the girl couldn´t hurt.

"Okay… okay! Maruyu will do her best for the Admiral!" Slowly she lightened up, and with an affirmative nod, she rushed out of the room, leaving me with my thoughts for a moment as I sipped on my coffee.

For a moment.

"Oi, Admiral." A harsher voice came from the door, and Tenryuu came into the room after knocking on the doorframe once. "Whats the little pipsqueak so excited about?"

"I allowed her to make me breakfast for today." No reason to lie, there. "Seems like Maru just likes every little thing she can be useful with."

"Tsk, seems that way." She retorted, coming over to my desk and sitting down on the edge of it, legs crossed. "So, when are we gonna go for a battle, huh?"

"Pardon…?" I blinked, coffee in hand.

"A battle. Shooting Abyssals. Boom, boom, dead ships. Ya got my drift?"

"I know what a battle is, Tenryuu." I sighed a bit. While she certainly was prettier than Maruyu, she… also had her downsides. "You´re like a chick who just hatched from an egg, asking me when you´re going to fly. Be a bit more patient, we`ll do a few more resource runs first… we need more firepower, more ships, and some reserves. Right now, if we attack them, we only have the option of winning or absolute defeat."

"So? Ya scared?"

"Damn right I am." Glancing into her eye, she blinked a bit as I was being so blunt about it. "I`m scared for the sake of you guys. Maruyu is a swimming target, and no offense, Tenryuu, but there´s a lot of deadly things out there that would have you for breakfast."

"…Feh, pun intended, huh?" The girl dressed in a black boarding school uniform gestured over to the door, where Maruyu just returned, carrying a tray with my breakfast on it.

"No, actually, but that's a welcome surprise." I gave her a grin, and folded my hands as I noticed what Maru had whipped up- something simple, toast, various spreads, a scrambled egg, and even more coffee. I would probably need it, seeing how I still felt a bit drowsy.

"Looks fantastic, Maru, and it smells good too!" I praised her, making the girl smile a tiny bit. "So, are you guys hungry too?"

"U-uhm…" Maru began, but Tenryuu just rolled her eye at it. "I could go for some fuel, personally. Not like i´ll need it for a resource run, but it still tastes good."

"Not one for toast, are you, Tenryuu?" I teased, taking a bite out of one. It was slightly… burned, but who gave a damn, the girl did her best.

"That's not it. Maruyu made that for YOU specifically. It wouldn`t be right if I ate it." Up until that point I wasn't sure if she could eat it at all, but that cleared things up… a little.

"Th-then i`ll make some more!" Maruyu intercepted that one, raising her hand. "I... I need practice, anyways!"

Tenryuu groaned in response, rubbing her forehead. "Alright, alright. Lets all have a snack and then be fucking productive, I feel like i´m rusting, just sitting around here."

After eating lunch together with the two, and after many, many gazes of Tenryuu`s unrelentful eye, I finally gave in and decided to give them something to do.

"Alright, guys, here`s our mission for today. There`s an automated fuel production rig in the Orel sea, right here." I pointed at the map which once again was spread out by four fairies, one for each corner, as Tenryuu`s eye seem to… shine. "The rig has been out of commission for a few years now, due to the area being infested with Abyssals. We`ll head there with a few detours to disguise our intentions, then activate it, and recover whats left of the fuel there, then we head back. As i`ve said.. the Abyss is there, much more present than at any other of our regular resource corridors, so there´s a good chance we´ll get into a brawl with them. Does that sound good to you, Tenryuu?"

The purple haired one grinned, and slammed her fist into her open hand. "Hell yeah it does! Finally some action, just for me!"

"Not just for you. Maru will come along too, providing recon and carrying some fuel on the way back, and i`ll accompany you guys in my patrol boat."

This caused Tenryuu to blink in confusion.

"-You- want to come along, too?" Seems like she wasn`t used to commanders on the front line, and she almost became nervous at this thought. Made me chuckle… she was cute when she got this way, the lights on her…. Horns turned a different color, flushing pink.

"Yeah. Maruyu isn´t exactly a powerhorse of a warmachine, i`ll provide cover for her along with you. Besides, the more firepower we have, the more Abyssals we´ll bring down to the ground."

"Can´t argue with that, heh…" Tenryuu scratched the back of her head, now even cuter than before.

"S…so… Maruyu will help with the fight, too?" The little submarine asked, obviously having some second thoughts.

"As a supportive role, from the back, yes." I once again had to remind a fairy that pencil erasers, no matter how tasty they might smell, weren`t edible. It was just like with humans... some fairies were quite smart. Some of them... not so much.  
Either way, with this decided, i stood up, headed for the door and grabbed the sword off of the display table, grinning to the two girls. „Well then, shall we?"

The sea was calm, but the wind was harsh, spraying little droplets of water in my face whenever i got into Tenryuu`s wake. Maruyu was submerged below us, but i´d given her a waterproof radio to communicate with us as i moved into position, covering Maruyu`s flank, with Tenryuu taking up the other side. A V formation. „Alright, girls. We´re entering Abyssal waters... keep your eyes peeled, and stay calm." A flick of two switches later, the two 14,7mm machine guns sticking out of the rotating mount further ahead of the ship got moving, and i pulled the pins on the torpedos left and right of me, arming them. I was well aware these fast attack crafts weren´t very well armed, and barely better than speedboats, but with Abyssals as our enemies, i needed all the nimble swiftness i could get. With shipgirl sized torpedos and 14,7mm Sabot ammunition, i would be able to do some damage... so long as i avoided taking any.  
„Yosha." Tenryuu replied, placing a hand on the scabbard of her sword, her cannons tilting down into firing position. „Well? What are we waiting for...! Lets get going!"  
„Don`t rush into things, Tenryuu. This chain is only as strong as its weakest link. Maru can´t keep up with us if we floor it, and we might need the fuel for a prolonged fight." I attempted to calm her down, but the girl seemed to itch for a fight already. We had barely been at sea for an hour, and already i was missing the home port... something felt different, as if i was being watched. I kept looking left and right of me, but couldn´t see anyone but the purple haired girl.  
„Oi." She muttered over the sound of the engines. „Don´t lose -your- calm either, big man. That little sub might be our weakest link, but you`re the carabiner hooking our chain to the wall we´re holding up. If you snap, the wall´ll come crashing down."  
„Gotcha." I took a deep breath, and looked ahead, seeing the ghastly image of an old oil rig, converted for fuel production. „Our target´s up ahead."

„Admiral!" Maruyu`s voice came from the speaker of my radio, and i pressed the transmission button quickly.  
„What is it, Maru?"  
„There´s multiple hostiles approaching, head on!" Indeed, i could see it... a few dark spots in the water, hissing out towards us.. „T-torpedos!"  
„Dodge them, Maru!" I ordered quickly, before giving Tenryuu a sign- she pulled hard starboard, while i yanked the rudder over to the port side. Getting into a heart shape formation, we let Maruyu slip through them, while Tenryuu fired her torpedos into the water from their flank, i did the same, pulling a lever to let them fall off both sides of the boat... multiple explosions rocked the water, and the first thing that came up was decapitated by Tenryuu´s sword... It seemed like a Ro-class destroyer, but with its armor blown off there was a grotesque, mutilated, and partially cybernetic girl underneath, now missing a head, and falling dead into the water. „One!" she counted, swiping her sword aside.  
„Don´t get cocky now. Maru, you alright?"  
„Th-that was close!" Maruyu responded. „I`m alright! Heading for the rig! H-hold them off of me, please!"  
„Heh, ya scared? No reason to be scared when Tenryuu´s giving you cover!" Four more Abyssal vessels emerged from the sea- three Ro-class destroyers, some of them missing armor plating, and a Ha-class who had fired off its torpedos.  
„There they are...!" Grunting, i pulled over, grabbing the joystick that controlled the guns in front and pointed them over to the first Ro-class, pressing the trigger repeatedly for short, precise bursts.  
Over the terrible noise of the weapons, i could hear denting and screaming steel, a few sparks were seen as the Sabots pierced through the armor plates like a hot knife through butter... It pointed its turrets at me, although it never got the time to fire before i managed to disable it.  
Tenryuu´s lucky goddess was shining down on her too, as the single barreled guns mounted on her sides hit the Ha-class square in the center mass, the minitureized turrets sounding more like high powered rifles. „Hah!" They returned to neutral position, reloading their shells, while Tenryuu´s leg kicked one of the Ro´s in the... face? I presumed it was, as the other one had its head there. The blade on her boot lodged into its side, and she grunted, seeing the turrets of the enemy ship point up at her, but a prolonged burst of machine gun fire made that ease up, my speedboat slipping through their breaking formation.  
„Admiral!" I heard her say, but.. not as a praise. The Ha-class had its guns trained on me, and this time, it actually did fire- i ducked my head down as quickly as i could as a shell pierced through the windshield, leaving a warm trail of air hissing over my back, a second shell piercing the side of my boat, getting stuck there- a dud, thankfully.  
„Getting reckless now? What did i say before?!" Tenryuu scolded, throwing her sword precisely at the Ha-class and killing it, while freeing her foot from the Ro-class. A final one remained, and Tenryuu hopped over, using the dead body of the stabbed Ro as a stepping stone, reclaiming her sword- and while she did take two hits of her own, which exploded and ripped away some of her uniform, a mighty downward cleave bifurcated the Ro-class and caused its aft portion to explode.  
„Hah... seems to be the last of `em." Tenryuu released her breath, bringing her sword back up and into its sheath, while i inspected the damage on my boat. It was way above the waterline, so the shell didn´t do much, still... i didn´t like the feeling of having an explosive charge around my back, so i pulled it out, carefully, and tossed it into the water.  
Behind us, the rig gave off a loud hum, and its lights came on... seems like Maruyu had been sucessful in her mission as well.  
„Lets go inside and get you a drink, hm?" I grinned at Tenryuu, who then came over to my boat, reached out her fist and bumped it against mine.  
„Sounds like a blast. Lets do it."

Neither of us had noticed the black disc shape re-submerging into the water, after large blue luminous eyes had watched the battle..

„Wo." The word echoed through the room, the voice of the carrier bouncing off many surfaces of the green tinted steel, the wooden works of art and only escaped through broken bulkheads.  
„Did you hear... that, Midway?" A woman, clad in black, with two horns poking out from her forehead called out. Her glamerous black hair, neat and sleek, hung down to her lower back, halfway covering the steel covers of her spineal interface, mechanized parts directly going into her nervous system, a thick set of cables going back... to a looming monstrosity standing on four hands, and carrying massive turrets, three guns each, on its shoulders. It was blind, filled to the brim with weapons and had a maw big enough to swallow a destroyer whole. The woman, who´s red eyes glared into the dark room, crossing her hands in front of her supple chest which also featured cybernetic implants, was known as the Battleship Princess, one of the commanding units of the Abyssal fleet, and a legendary adversary capable of annhilating entire fleets on her own.  
„...You will notice that my... ears still work, Battleship." Another woman of similar size, but with even longer, pale white hair retorted, smaller, triangular horns on each side of her head, a dress similar to Battleship, but in white, her limbs covered in glowing scars. „Yet again... a cockroach got on its hind legs... to challange a praying mantis."  
„They managed.. . To reactivate installation seven... with no losses." Battleship interrrupted, but was silenced by a glare of the woman as she turned around to face her. Unlike Battleships beautiful face, Midway`s was halfway covered with bizarre growth made of blackened steel, covering her mouth and nose like a the muzzle of an attack dog. Her eyes, similary red, spoke of unimaginable sadisim and hatred, and she turned on her heel in a snap.  
„Installation seven..? A rusty oil rig... for their shipgirls to feed on...? You`re scared, because.. a young cockroach... came across a fountain?! We are one step... one step away... from reclaiming my lost kingdom, and you...! You concern yourself... with a weakling?! An unarmed submarine, a light cruiser... outdating even the lowest of our own, and... a young boy in a speedboat! That gets the mighty Battleship Princess to tremble... in fear?!"  
„I apologize. I merely thought... we should investigate... and deploy one of our agents... to sabotage their roots." Battleship bowed her head, sinking to one knee, Wo doing the same.  
„...So be it, Sister. I shall create... the ideal adversary for this weak man. She will... bring him to an early end." Midway glanced back to her sister, and turned around to look over her plans again. „Now cease to bother me... with this nonsense!"  
„Yes. Come on... Wo."  
„Wo."  
The two of them left, Battleship gritting her teeth and swallowing a comment she was about to make, as Midway looked over to a preticular piece of wreckage she could see out of one window.  
„...Kirishima... Yes... she will be... adequate building material... for this weapon of vengence."


	4. Unforseen consequences of Ten-chan

Three days, and two sorties later i was convinced that although Tenryuu was trying her hardest, it wasn´t going to be enough on the long-term. Some improvements had to be made… and so, I had given out the order to fabricate some new equipment to the fairies.  
When I got to the factory floor on the early afternoon, though, my eyes nearly popped out of my head as amidst the grimy floor, which aided to the odor of the room which used to be a gym hall and now was full of heavy machinery, some of which reaching up to the ceiling. CNC machines, a small foundry, a forge, automatic hammers and a production facility for ammunition and smaller spare parts- the fairies had everything needed to keep this base going, and equip a thousand men- or a few dozen shipgirls.

Now, though, they proudly presented me something that was more than half the size I was, and was never going to fit on any of Tenryuu´s barbettes. A miniaturized version of the 46cm three-gun turret the Yamato class was famous for- weighing the equivalent of a destroyer and having enough recoil to propel a car a few miles far, at least in real scale, there was no way she`d ever be able to use it.  
"…Look, guys, i`m proud of you, doing that on the very first go… but I think you got something mixed up there. THAT. Is not going to FIT on Tenryuu or Maruyu, not even if they both carry it at the same time. What are we supposed to use it for?"  
A fairy then bounced up to my shoulder from a nearby worktable, and talked with its tiny voice into my ear.  
"What do you mean, spares? Replacements? For what? We don´t have a… what?"  
The remaining fairies handed me a sheet of paper, a telex by the looks of it- the one sending it seemed to have gotten the addresses mixed up and sent it to them and not to me.  
….The contents of it made my face go pale, and I stared at the turret once again, before carefully setting down the fairy on the ground. "L-look, just… build something Tenryuu`s size now. And… I don´t know, put that thing in storage. Who knows, maybe we´ll get to use it in the future. …I`ll be in my office."  
And off I went, turning on my heel and running through the hallway, up the stairs, passing by a surprised Tenryuu and another girl I didn´t recognize, but had no time for. This had to be a mixup of some sort. I just started earlier this week, there was no way….!  
I didn´t even sit down, I just grabbed the phone and punched the number in that was noted on the paper, then nervously paced back and forth in my office until the one on the other end of the line picked up.  
"Admiral Moran, Sir! Lieutenant Commander Yamamoto here. There seems to be a mixup of some kind in progress, Sir, the fairies received your word sooner than I did, about the transfer… No, Sir, you don`t understand, i`m grateful for it, but we don`t have the resources…"  
From behind the doorframe, one, two and three heads popped up, looking carefully into the office.  
"Sir! With all due respect, you can´t just dismiss someone because they`re not… kawaii! I understand you only like destroyers, but she`s your responsibili….. yes, I know I outrank you. There´s no reason to remind me. But the fact remains that you`re trying to give away a living person like a kitten you don`t want! …"  
My hand that wasn´t holding the phone balled up, and the knuckles popped, fingers growing white. I thought I could see Maruyu swallow and weep out the corner of my eye while I kept pacing left and right.  
"Sir. Returning to topic. What do we do about this? There is no way I can support her just now. I`ve just started this Monday, and we can barely supply ourselves by now. Give me a month, then…."  
My eyes widened, and my jaw fell as I paled further, causing even Tenryuu to get uneasy, from what I could see.  
"No! No, no… no. Don`t scrap her. If you really can´t help it… i`ll take her, i´ll find a way to support her… just… don´t scrap her. I`ll expect her around the scheduled time. …. Of course, Sir. Have a pleasant day."  
I hung up by smacking the phone down on the receiver.  
"Is what your mother said last night!"

With all three shipgirls staring at me like i´d gone mad, I sat down on my office desk and took a sip of the cold, nasty coffee from the early morning hours that slapped me in the face like Mr T. About now I noticed the grey haired girl that stood slightly taller than Tenryuu, and while her eyes seem out of focus, she was the only one who was still smiling, standing still and waiting for her turn. I remembered something right then.  
"…You´re the new arrival, right? I heard something about that earlier this morning." I pointed at her with my finger, the rest of them still holding the coffee mug, as I got up and adjusted my cap. "Sorry about that, you caught me in a bad moment. I`m Shichiro Yamamoto, commanding officer of this base."  
"Its fine, Admiral… I am the standard carrier Unryuu… assigned to work with you from now on.." She bowed lightly, and already I found her a bit odd. Why did she… pause her sentences like that? Its like she was really struggling for words. Still, she was… well, the combination of Maruyu´s cuteness and Tenryuu`s good looks… I swallowed dryly, looking her over once, and retreated behind my desk to sit down…

I have to confess something here. Women never interested me… I could get along with them just fine, befriend them, but they never… interested me in a sexual sense. Neither did men, thank the heavens, but in general, I was lacking interest for my fellow humans as partners… since I was fourteen years old, I had been to eight different therapists, and none of them helped much.

Unryuu, and for that matter, Tenryuu too… were quite amazingly attractive in my eyes. And it didn´t help that the carriers choice of clothing was a lot… less restrained than Tenryuu`s. I just felt at ease behind my desk, knowing they couldn´t see what was going on in my pants just then, and looked up Unryuu`s statistics sheet to have some sort of cover about why I went there to begin with.

"So, you`re a standard carrier then… those are pretty costly, too…" I sighed a bit, looking over some other stats, but she interrupted me with a smile.

"I don´t eat much… its bad for my hips…" Your hips are fine as far as i`m concerned, Unryuu-chan, is what I thought, but of course I repressed that and nodded slowly. "Well, either way, we could use the firepower, since you`ve got guns equipped too. …but.. no airplanes?"  
She shook her head. "No… my planes aren´t… built yet." How odd. What is an aircraft carrier without aircraft? A battleship without guns, that's what. Maybe she could use that 46cm OH RIGHT.

"By the way." Tenryuu interrupted us, coming fully into the room. "What the hell was that just now, eh? Did he kill your sister or something? I heard something `bout scrapping."  
I shook my head, giving off a light sigh. "Admiral Moran`s fairies constructed something he didn´t like by accident, so he gave her to me. He only likes destroyers, apparently."  
Tenryuu`s eye lit up in a spark, and she slapped her hands on my desk, drawing… quite close, which made me scoot back a bit. "Oh?! Ohh? What is it? Is it a cruiser? My sister Tatsuta, perhaps?"  
"….Its a battleship. A big one." I swallowed hard, spacing my hands apart as far as I could manage to visualize. "Hence me telling him its impossible, but he said he`d scrap her otherwise because no one else he asked wants her."  
Tenryuu`s eyes widened about as far as mine did when I saw that cannon earlier. "For serious?! So this lolicon-asshat is gonna scrap someone cuz she`s no little girl?! …Man, I almost want the Abyss to win now."  
"I know, I know." I sighed, looking back to Unryuu who still stood there, smiling. "Its going to be a harsh week, Unryuu. I hope you`re ready for a lot of work, because we´ll have to secure a stable and consistent flow of resources if we don´t want to starve Musashi out."

"M…mmu…Musashi?!" Tenryuu seemed like she was about to faint from all the news, and stumbled back a bit. "S-seriously…. This guy…? D-do you know… how… how big…"  
I nodded. I heard the rumors… big guns, big appetite. Big ego too, according to some sources, but I wouldn´t be biased until I met her. Afterall, she could be really nice once you got to know her…  
"Well, either way, by the time the fairies are finished with Tenryuu`s new equipment we`ll go on another resource run. Then, perhaps, i`ll construct a destroyer to help us out carrying stuff, and-"  
Tenryuu cut me off. She recovered faster than I would`ve liked from her battleship shock there.  
"And THEN we go on a real battle?! That's what you were gonna say, right?! I`m a cruiser, not a battleship or aircraft carrier, I get that, but I want to fight too! I wanna bash some faces in, ya got my drift?!"  
God, what was it with her? I told her numberous times that we needed more resources before we`d have any sort of fighting chance, but she just won´t listen. A glance fell on the Taisho sword in the other end of the room, and I looked back at Tenryuu.  
"…Meet me in the mess hall in fifteen minutes then. I`ll give you a battle."  
"…Huh? S-say what?!" Didn`t think that was gonna happen, did ya, Tenryuu. Even Unryuu, who was quiet and calm until now, widened her eyes.  
"You can handle yourself with a sword, so i`ll be your opponent. We`re still being trained how to use those in military school, after all." I explained to her, folding my hands in a display of calm demeanor. "The mess hall is the best place for that, we can just make ourselves some free room there to fight with. But first, i`ll show Unryuu her room."  
With that said, I stood up and adjusted my uniform, leaving the speechless Tenryuu behind and gesturing the carrier to follow, which she did. I gave Maru, who was still standing outside, a grin and a wink, then headed down the hallway.

"Are you sure that's a good idea… Admiral…?" Unryuu asked me, following with her hands folded behind her back. Thankfully, by now my loins had calmed down again, and I forced myself to look another way.  
"She needs to cool off her head, and it might be fun, both for her and for me. I see where she´s coming from, we`re not doing much other than gathering resources… and we´ll have to do that a lot more until Musashi arrives, but that's no reason to keep complaining. I can´t change that, afterall."  
Unryuu nodded with a light smile. "You and Tenryuu seem really close."  
"Huh? …Ah, well, she`s a bit annoying with her antics, but she´s got a good… heart? Boiler? You know what i mean." What was she trying to pull, talking about that?  
"Ehehe… An Admiral should be very close to their ships, I think… they`re risking their lives for them, so the Admiral should give them something back for it. Making them feel good, making them happy for the limited time they might have until they sink…"  
She had a point there, I had to admit. But she was sounding very… suggestive there. Again, what was she trying to pull? Making them feel good?  
"True. Although… I don´t know a lot about shipgirl anatomy, really. Can you guys even… feel anything or is it just like a feedback of data..? …sorry if that sounds insensitive, I genuinely have no idea. The fairies don´t tell me anything."  
Unryuu smiled however and gave me a nod. "We feel just as much as you people do… Love, hate, passion, pain, lust… all those things you humans feel… we´re weapons, yes, but the fairies did a splendid job giving us… life."  
….Lust? Again, suggestive. I was starting to think she was attempting to toy with me. And I was starting to think I wouldn`t mind that terribly much.  
"Lust, huh? Does that mean you guys can… you know? Reproduce?"  
A tiny blush appeared on her cheeks, which I found incredibly cute, but she giggled nonetheless.  
"Ufufufu~ We can`t bear children, no… a weapon that multiplies would be… bad. But, ah, the process of it… we`re capable of –that-"  
Oh. Oooooh. I started to walk a bit behind her, as I felt something happen in my pants again… thankfully, her room was fast approaching, and I stopped beside its door.  
"Well, this is yours, Unryuu. I hope it's all to your liking, otherwise i`ll see what I can do about changing that."  
Still blushing a bit, Unryuu nodded with a smile, and slid her hand onto the doorknob. "It will be, I am sure of it. Thank you, Admiral… And please be careful fighting Tenryuu…"  
I gave her a nod to affirm it, and as she opened the door…  
…about thirty fairies were bouncing around on the bed, drinking miniature shots of an energy drink, built a merry-go-round out of an old ceiling fan and rode around on it, while others were doing… things under the bed. It looked like they were trying to drag something heavy out from below it.  
"….Oh." Was all I could utter, while Unryuu covered her mouth to hold back laughter. It was a good thing, she seemed okay with what was going on while I was just stunned at the sheer stupidity those little guys were capable of.  
"Ufufufu, i`ll get along with them just fine, Admiral, don`t worry about me… I believe Tenryuu is waiting, no?"

After that experience, I almost felt right at home when I got to the mess hall, having picked up the sword on the way there. Tenryuu was already in, waiting for me, having taken off her rigging and yet still keeping the sword in hand.  
"You really have some balls, comin` here afterall. I thought you`d do the smart thing and resign. There's no way you´d win against a shipgirl, man." She taunted, stepping into a cleared area in the middle of the hall.  
"You want to fight, and as your commanding officer I have to tend to your needs. So here we are- you´re getting a fight." I responded, vaulting over a table in front of me to step into the "ring" as well. Having never drawn the Taisho I didn´t know if it was actually a sharp, genuine sword or just a decorational piece, but for the sake of my neck, and various other limbs, I hoped for the former. Tenryuu grinned lightly, glaring at me.  
"Tsk. Well, I give ya that. You –do- have a crapload of balls. I knew that right when you were coming along on a mission with us, but this? Hell, I like ya. You`ve got guts. …Lets see some of them."  
With this one-liner she probably heard from a movie, she drew her sword and dashed forth, giving out a war cry- I too drew my sword, taking a few steps forward, but rather than using my own blade to block hers, I whacked the red-tinted edge away from me using the wooden sheath of my sword, then reached out to her with my blade.

She stopped it with her palm before it would reach her chest, though, pressing it away and giving me a harsh kick to the guts, briefly winding me- She really wasn´t going to hold back, huh? That one actually hurt. So be it, I tossed the sheath aside, and held the sword with both hands… briefly thinking it was dull, seeing how Tenryuu could touch it with no problem, I parried two of her slashes with blocks of my own, then sidestepped and brought the blade diagonally upward…  
It ripped straight through her uniform, but I could feel it impacting her skin with virtually no damage, superficial, at most. A bit of red oozed out from the faint line I made, but I had no time to say I was sorry, as Tenryuu kept the pressure up and forced me back with a series of fast, one-handed attacks and some footwork.  
"I didn´t know shipgirls could bleed..!" I brought out underneath my breathing, and a faint grin appeared on her face.  
"Didn`t know ya cared. Its just some stuff that keeps our bodies warm. Looks like blood for cosmetic reasons or something."  
From then on in her aggressive assault grew more intense, from barely dodging an overhead swing and parrying a horizontal slash, my options grew limited, I had to turn this around and quick or she might take my head off. I realized just how sharp her blade was in comparison to mine when a slice I had barely escaped cut one of the brass buttons on my uniform in two… I had wondered just how well that sword cut through the destroyers the other day. Still, either my blade was made of a similar material or she was holding back.  
My arm was telling me the first thing, because blocking was starting to hurt.  
I leaned back underneath a slash aimed for my head, and gave her a harsh kick in the groin instead, which sent her flying half a meter and fall on her side, but she rolled, stopped on her knees and jumped right back up, while my leg was now feeling like i`d limp for a while.  
"Fucking snake…" Tenryuu grunted, but still grinned a bit, wiping some sweat off of her forehead while swiping her sword left and right to find proper balance.  
"Is that some sort of nickname? You haven`t seen it yet." I teased, somehow I just felt like doing a joke that would make her blush… and It took a moment, but then she flared up red, glared, and leaped at me with a strike. I stepped aside, letting her hit thin air, before bringing down my own sword again, where it crashed against hers rather than slice over her shoulder.  
"Is that why you keep aiming for my shirt, ya skirt-chasing pervert?"  
"I could aim there for a whole number of reasons…. But those big pillows are a huge target."  
A number of diagonal slashes and equal blocks followed, our blades crashing against one another again and again, legs pressing against the opponent in an attempt to break through the defense… in the strain, our foreheads touched, sweat trickling down each of them, and our eyes stared deep into one another- before we both broke the block. I tried to trap her legs and make her fall, but instead, she brought her sword forth and clenched her legs around mine attempting to do the same to me- I would fall, would I try to dodge in this state.

I so loved that shocked expression when she thought her blade would sink into my body, when I actually clamped it down between my upper left arm and my chest… a quarter second later, I spun around on my heel, yanking the blade out of her hand, falling to the ground and burying her under my weight.  
Tenryuu`s sword clattered on the floor just out of arms reach, and I couldn´t find a reason not to put my blade against the purple haired girls neck.  
"This one goes to me, Ten-chan." I teased, receiving a glare at first, but then she sticked out her tongue instead.  
"That was… fun." She admitted, relaxing her body as her arms slacked to the sides. I too eased up, tossing my sword aside, panting shallow breaths on top of her body.  
That's when the adrenaline ebbed down, and I noticed how… soft she was. Soft, warm, comfortable…  
…this was a girl made of metal, right? She felt just what I remembered my mother to feel like… what human women probably felt like… very, very nice.  
"Oi… you can get up now." She groaned, a bit out of breath from having my weight on her chest.  
"Nah. I`m enjoying myself right here. Let me bask in my triumph a little, Ten-chan."  
"You´re heavy. And who`re you calling Ten-chan?!"  
I grinned back at her, my cheeks feeling warm- I didn´t know if it was because of the physical excercise or the closeness to her. Probably both.  
"I`ll stop calling you Ten-chan if you stop complaining about expeditions, Ten-chan. "  
"Oi! Stop going Ten-chan this and Ten-chan that already! I get it, resources important, battles not important. Now will you get off?" Oh my god this was way too much fun.  
"Hm, maybe. What are you paying me?"  
"A kick to the nuts, you perverted idiot!"  
"Am I now? You don`t seem to mind."  
She glared at me. "Shut up."  
"You know, I always wondered what was under that eyepatch~"  
I reached out for the eyepatch, and as soon as I did, her leg came up to kick me as advertised but still honed down on combat, my legs clamped down and stopped it right there, while my hand brought the patch off of her eye.  
Underneath was a burnt, blue-tinted scar, eyelids permanently shut by what looked like a surgical string, a deep, gruesome scar that slowly paled going vertically up her lower eyelid to the forehead. She looked aside, and blushed, falling silent.  
"….You had to look, huh."  
I nodded. "The fairies can`t fix that?"  
"No. They said something about the plans being damaged. Its fine though, reminds me of that damn bomb that struck me back in the days." Tenryuu said in a quiet, regretful voice, and I nodded again slowly, running my finger carefully over the scar, making her twitch. I heard of that, the battle of Savo Island, she survived but lost 53 crewmen out of her complement of 327.  
"I guess an eyepatch suits a war veteran like you quite well. Still, I don`t mind seeing that."  
"You don`t?"  
I shook my head as an answer. "No, its fine for me. That scar`s part of your identity. It's a testament to your long and eventful life, and how you protected your friends and companions. Getting struck by a bomb would sink a destroyer, you know."  
Slowly, her face brightened up, still looking to the side, before turning back to me. I had noticed her lights had turned pink again, but her face seemed pretty stern.  
"You`re a bastard, you know that? Picking on a girl while she´s down."  
"I was just going to encourage you a bi-"  
Her hand covered my mouth, cutting me off.  
"Shut up, and get up. We`ll do a round of hand-to-hand combat next…. And then i`ll collect your damn resources."

….

"_Who is this?"  
"A shipgirl. They call her… Shoukaku, I believe... hit by a cut-in attack of Re."  
"There`s barely… anything left…"  
"Indeed. She will be… ideal for the experiment… Nazara has proposed."_

Tubes. Powerplants. Gears and hydraulics all too human and aesthetically pleasing.

The Abyss did not use these… their methods were crude in appearance, but undoubtfully, they were functional. This was the main difference between a shipgirl and an Abyssal. Humans desired aesthetics, which stood in the way of higher functionality. The Abyss didn´t make such sacrifices. Body fluids for the sole purpose of warming it? Useless. Removed from the finished product. Eyes that cannot see in the dark? A hinderance. Abyssal eyes glowed red, but they even saw plasma bubbles on the surface of the sun. Shipgirls that could not breath underwater?  
….remove the lungs, replace them with tanks. Now it was a submarine.  
The Abyss had no need for aesthetics, they didn´t need to appeal to anyone in general. The Princesses retained some of their original beauty, but they were purpose build to taunt and entangle Admirals into a lethal trap.  
This girl, however… a wide array of modifications and changes, which`s scars would take days to heal, covered the skin of someone who used to be a ship, which now… bore life. Flesh, even. An uncanny resemblance to a human, lacking the hardpoints and attachments for rigging that shipgirls had, this woman was an artificial human to boot. In theory, this should give it all the cunning, daring intelligence the humans had, the same unpredictable and unreasonable maneuvers that were so effective against the Abyss would be used against them. Or so was the theory.  
This experiment became known as the Abyssal Admiral to anyone uninvolved, anyone who hadn`t heard, or daren`t speak her name.

A week had passed since they put the pieces together, and once more, she came into the war room of the mid-pacific Abyssal base- previously known as the Queen Mary II.  
Her long black hair, cut orderly in Hime-fashion, slid over her back and blended into the equally black uniform, red eyes glaring into the room that was populated by three people, not counting herself, Battleship Princess, the Southern War Princess and Midway Princess. Southern War had come for a general overview of the situation, but normally resided in her own base, an ancient human ocean liner that had been dragged ashore onto a tiny island. Battleship Princess had no such base, but rather simply resided in the many shipwrecks of Ironbottom Sound, and Midway… was here for now, left without a home by the humans who had repelled previous attempts of claiming her namesake kingdom of Midway Station.  
As soon as they noticed the demonic human, glares from all around fell upon the woman, but all silenced when Midway began to speak.  
"My creation… has been completed. I have sent her… out to the Okinawa base, to espionage… and sabotage… their actions." The gallant white-haired princess spoke, placing her scarred hand on the map laid out in front of them. "I hope… this puts your worries to rest, Battleship."  
"I did not… worry, Midway." Battleship grumbled. "I was merely insisting… that we do not sit back… and watch that boy come to power."  
"Let him rise, and then… crush him with overwhelming force… is what I would do." Southern War Princess interrupted, a smirk on her face. "I do enjoy… to see their faces when… the curtain is drawn." The womans hair was tied into twintails, the hairbands of which seemed like they were on fire to the unkeen observer. Despite this, her attire merely consisted of steel bands standing in for garter belts, a single, armored stocking, heeled shoes and a half destroyed pair of hotpants, the rest was bare. Yet, she seemed not the least bit concerned about it, in fact, she seemed… proud about the display of her body.  
"That's a waste of time… and resources, both of which… we have too little of to throw them… in his way. He should be dealt with... swiftly and brutally." Battleship threw in, until the Admiral finally rammed her fist on the table.  
"Enough with this bickering! You`re starting to sound like a tea party for old hags…! Midway's spy will take care of the boy. We have bigger problems to get rid of." A glare was received from two of them, while Midway seemed indifferent about what the Admiral said. "Case in point- Admiral Moran of the British empire and his numerous destroyer fleets. Another would be Admiral Hackett and his cruiser-carrier mixture. Captain Tanaka, with the… unusual tactics of her shipgirls, Admiral Kiichiro`s relentless and absolute brutality, Commodore Creed with his large-scale carrier operations, Major General Matsuda`s continuous streak of luck, and Commander Yamanashi… whom I have no comment on."  
A moment of silence was given for the last one, as each Abyssal remembered what state they found Seaport Princess in after she was left in the hands of Misa Yamanashi. One would think that woman was a man in the wrong body. And why did Seaport look so happy about it?  
"What is your point… Admiral?" Battleship gave back, raising an eyebrow.  
"My point is that its pointless to keep attacking their fleets like this." The response was received with glares all around. "We receive shipwrecks in return, but our losses are far higher. Ignore the fleets, attack the home ports. If the docks are destroyed, they have nowhere to return to and become easier prey." A sound logic, and yet…  
"Were you raised… in a barn?" Southern War began, flicking her finger against Admiral`s forehead. "The home ports CONTAIN… their fleets. They don`t… attack us with just one of them… the rest remains there, defending that port…! …I can see your point. Truly, I do. But attacking a port… is suicide, so long as it isn´t… a very, very large fleet of ours."  
"And whats the problem with that…?" Admiral retorted, now with a red mark on her head. "We have thousands of ships, but only a couple of hundred attack at once."  
"Big fleets… have risks to them… a nuclear weapon could wipe out a third of our fleet, should they travel together." Battleship responded, being much more patient than the other two. "And it's simply… too complex, to navigate… thousands of ships around at once."  
"Then get the Behemoth to do it, that would-"  
Suddenly, Midway's arm reached out and lifted Admiral from the ground, her clawed fingers digging into the womans neck.  
"You do not SPEAK in such a way about it…! You do not TALK about the Queens flagship as if you own it! Behemoth is our safe haven, it is NOT up for discussion! Exposing it to the humans could mean the end of our species!" Midway hissed at her, speaking fast and fluid rather unlike the usual pauses between sentences.  
Choking and gurgling under the steely grip of the Midway Princess, Admiral brought out no words until the fingers gave way, just as sudden as they gripped around the woman, they also let go and dropped her to the ground, turning around.  
"As it seems you are still not ready to command us, Admiral… I will make the decision myself."  
Stepping over to another table, which appeared to be a Roulette game table, she pulled a small pearl, shining with an inner light from her gown. On the board, the names of the various Admirals were assigned to the various numbers of the roulette wheel, with a flick of her thumb, the pearl began to roll across and into the wheel. A flick of her wrist made it spin, and the number it landed on made her grin.

"Number seven… Commodore Creed it is."

* * *

**A/N:** _Captain Tanaka, Admiral Moran and Commodore Creed are OCs of a friend of mine, used with permission. Admiral Hackett is, obviously, a reference to Admiral Steven Hackett of Mass Effect fame, Major General Matsuda is Major Matsuda from the Pixiv doujin author Tonda and his ongoing series "Macho Admiral and the Fleet Girls", Lieutenant Commander Misa Yamanashi belongs to Pixiv doujin author Buntaichou. I recommend checking out their stories, either on Pixiv or on Danbooru, where they are in translated form._


	5. The birth and death of a shipgirl

I had gotten a first taste of what it really meant to be the Admiral of those girls.  
And by that i don`t mean the black eye and the bruises i got from the hand-to-hand session with Tenryuu, but… well, i was in no condition to go with them this time. For once, the girls went on an expedition on their own, leaving me behind with my thoughts and my loneliness.

After giving the headquarters my reports, looking over the fleets movements in regard to the enemies movements, and finally, drinking lots of coffee, i found myself with nothing to do. At all.

There was no one here, except the fairies which weren´t very talkative and for the most part were quite hard to understand. I didn`t want to waste my time playing games or watching TV, either. I had a job to do, even though I didn`t know what to do with it. An idea came to me, and although selfish, it was my only option at this point… checking the resource status, I nodded to myself and went down to the factory. Musashi wouldn`t arrive until tomorrow, so my only option now was to build a new ship.

What I didn`t expect was that there was someone already there. Amongst the fairies, there was someone in the back room, an almost mature girl with long, neatly tied pink hair wearing what looked like a sailor uniform- and smoking a cigarette while welding a damaged turret back together, without bothering with a protective mask, instead she simply had a pair of sunglasses on. A boombox on one of the shelves was playing what seemed like a mixture of techno music and hardcore, American rap- at least I assumed it was American, since the singer yelled something about "niggers" "smoke em` dead" and "fucked yo wife".  
"Uhm…." I began, raising my hand, which made the girl look over her shoulder to notice me, raising an eyebrow, before turning down the music.

"Yeah? What do you want?" Not the sort of welcome I would`ve expected. Then again I didn´t know what I was expecting with this sort of setup.  
"…I was going to commission a new ship, but for now… I didn`t see you before." That was a weak response, but I couldn´t help it. My surprise was too much to give any sort of punchline comeback right now.  
"Name`s Akashi. Been here since Maruyu came." She grumbled, taking a drag from her cigarette. "I`m just the repairship though, so i`m not gonna go into combat or anything. Wouldn´t have much of a point. … So you´re the Admiral, huh? …What the fuck happened to your face?"

"I see…" Well, there´s a lot I didn`t see, but that was a start at least. "Well, yes, i´m the commander of the base, Shichiro Yamamoto, I got into a bit of… an argument before, and… is that fairy doing what I think it is?"  
I pointed over to a little blue haired fairy that seemed to inhale fumes from a puddle of oil with a straw. Upon me pointing it out, Akashi instantly got quite mad.  
"Oh for the love of…! How many times do I have to tell you numbnuts not to get high during work hours?!" Well, they certainly had a good role model there.  
"E-either way." I started, trying to keep her from keelhauling that fairy. "Since you´re familiar here, I was wondering if I could watch how the new ship is built."  
That moment about five fairies started arguing with me, and I didn`t get a word of it, while Akashi sighed.  
"Nope. Being built is like being born, ya know. It's the most intimate moment in a ship`s life…. Except unlike a human birth you also get to see their bones and guts."  
That sounded… nasty, but I still wanted to see it. For numerous reasons. The shipgirls became more and more human to me, and I wanted to know just how human they really were… where the machine ended and the girl began.  
"I won´t tell anyone else. I just want to see it once.. get a better understanding of shipgirls in general. Everything Unryuu and Tenryuu tell me baffles to a degree, and its starting to get embarrassing as if didn´t know what I was doing." I explained, hoping she would understand.  
….She did not, and we ended up arguing for another half hour, before finally she gave in as half the fairies had gone to sleep by this point.  
"Ugh! Fine, fine! Don`t blame me if she hates you when the whole thing`s done and over with. So whats it gonna be, huh?" Akashi asked, her eyebrow twitching in irritation as she glared at me.  
"A destroyer this time. We`ll need a couple of those for the future." I responded to her, arms crossed triumphantly as I grinned slightly. "Think the fairies can do that?"  
"They`re as dumb as a doornail, but they can handle machinery. They`ll build you a spaceship if you give them enough resources."  
The fairies got moving just as she mentioned that, hushing over to an archive of blueprints before selecting one (The one on top of the pile, that is, which would explain the randomness of the results) before putting it into a scanner, which translated it into the machines… they then got moving, shifting and changing the molds with a huge amount of racket, adjusting size and shape of the components to the ship`s size and measurements. At the same time, more fairies carried steel, bauxite blocks and chemicals to the forge up above, dumping them into the smelting pot.  
"The first step in building a ship is making the materials- that's also what takes the longest amount of time. Destroyer alloys are lightweight but weak, we can make those in a few minutes. Whipping up the palladium-dornite armor for a battleship on the other hand… that takes a while." Akashi explained, gesturing over to the smelting pot. "Steel and Bauxite are heated to 2300 degrees, before electrodes change the molecular structure of the alloy. The materials only differ for whats underneath the first layer- the topmost layer is always the same."  
A hiss followed, and after a few minutes of waiting, the pot opened a hatch on the lower end and boiling hot metal poured out into forms, where it was cooled down to blocks of it in just a few seconds, heat treated and hardened. The fairies pulled out equally shaped blocks of the material, a blue-tinted, shimmering metal, before placing it on a conveyor, where they were sent to various work platforms… as they were labelled, each one was for a different part of the limbs.  
"Next, the building of the frame. The bones. Well, most call it a chassis, because that's what it basically is.. its holding us together, and its where everything is attached to. Each class has its own chassis, with very little differences in between ships… for instance, the Yamato class ships all have the same frame under all that armor. Real ship plans are used, so anything´s possible- any ship you want can be made into a shipgirl, no matter what kind. The computer will adapt the measurements of the ship, the armor thickness, the abilities and the history and convert it into the pieces necessary for construction."  
Lathes, drills, CNC machines and grinders started to work on the blocks of metal, carving out piece after piece which resembled bones the most, although it was by no means a human bone- it looked like it from afar, but the pale blue color as well as the lack of any biological shortcomings, and the hardpoints all over it gave it sort of an uncanny feel. Two fairies brought over a container from a machine in the corner, and upon opening it, it revealed what looked like a brain… except it didn´t look like anything you`d seen in a biology class. It more or less consisted of carbon-wrapped tubes, thicker and thinner fiberglass wires, electronic components that I couldn´t possibly hope to identify. It was placed in one of the carved out pieces that roughly resembled a head, before it was closed up… the fairies kept working on it, not allowing me to see. Supposedly they had to build the whole thing before putting the shipgirl together.  
Speaking of that, the next station we came to they assembled the bones of arms and legs, testing their flexibility and functionality. Bolts and black rubber connected them, the blued steel limbs reminded me of prosthetics when seen from afar. Of course, it didn`t take long for them to put them onto the midsection, which was assembled in the middle of the factory.  
"There we are- Tritanium bones joining together to form something awesome. The alloy´s light, the assembled frame merely weighs sixty pounds, but it takes thirty five tons to separate the limb from the body once its properly assembled." Akashi explained, and I noticed the ribcage could actually be folded open at this point of the process- as fairies lifted flexible tanks, most likely the lungs, several kilometers of tubing and wires, various machines, ….something that very much resembled a uterus and a compact, hexagonal machine into the frame.  
"Whats that…? It doesn`t look nearly as advanced as the rest." I asked, pointing at the hexagonal thing that seemed to have an endless amount of connectors on it.  
"The central conversion unit. It converts fuel into electricity and steel into useable material for the nanites inside their system to repair them… I guess you could call it the heart, it does give off a thump each time it burns up fuel, afterall. The stuff attached below is for converting human food into energy- a much less efficient process."  
….So that was a shipgirls heart… a metal box, barely bigger than my fist. Somehow that depressed me… the whole process seemed bizarre and surreal, but something so simple and unappealing was their only way to live… they would die if it would fail.  
"Hey, Akashi." I asked, bothered by this. "…Do shipgirls die when that thing fails..? Is it… possible for them to die?"  
She nodded slowly. "I guess you could call it that. You can put them back together, sure, but the brain`s fragile… if the CCU fails, it could short circuit. Either way its going to fragment a bit, and the memory core isn´t going to last very long without electricity. …what does it matter though, when they sink they`ll be crushed by the water pressure anyway." I swallowed as to how….. indifferent she was about that topic. Perhaps she didn`t like to be about people for a very good reason… either way, the fairies were done by the time I had finished asking about that, and they sealed the ribcage before the head was attached, thousands of wires sown together to connect the girl.  
"Next, we fuel up the system, add the coolant water and fill up the temperature keeping fluid… you know, that red stuff they bleed, give it a dry run, and then follows the meat- silicium-carbonite, bulletproof muscle. …though that stuff is only used for destroyers, because even a rifle causes damage to that. Its not the best kinda material."  
Said and done, grey tubes were attached to the limbs and hooked up to the other tubes, before they were… inflated, one could say, to the correct size, kept like this for a moment, and then they moved on to the next muscle. By now this looked like a biology project for xenophilics, as sensors and other such functions were added… especially in the chest area, where two little humps of soft looking… stuff bedded them. Finally, Akashi patted me on the shoulder.  
"Dry run. You might wanna turn around."  
And by that she really wasn´t kidding. The body that still had no skin on began to move, flexing and wiggling into every direction- it was bizarre, like something out of a horror show, until it finally stopped and the fairies seemed satisfied- at which point the body was hoisted up, moved over to a large, rectangular box, where it was strapped inside and closed firmly.  
"Finally, the Organium… the flesh. Its in two layers- the lower one provides temperature control, with the so-called bloodstream on top of it, and on top of that is the final layer… the layer you see everyday." She poked her own arm to demonstrate. "Once that's complete, little details are added- finger and toenails, hair, the coloration… or paintjob, I guess you could call it. Then she`s done… what follows is outfit and weapons, but the shipgirl herself is completed. So yeah, you can hush off to your office, unless you wanna see the girl naked."  
I blinked a bit, looking over to the pink haired one. "Why so hostile all of the sudden…? I didn´t mean to bother you."  
She huffed, turning around and grabbing onto the railing. "I have good reasons for being down here, rather than at the front! Been repairing shipgirls for years now- served under five different Admirals. Each one… crappier than the last. Both in performance and in character. When their toys ceased to work, I was useful to them- as long as i`d fix them up, they`d leave me alone. I was responsible for scrapping them, too. Getting rid of the bodies, so to speak… its an even nastier job than this, pulling a ship apart and melting it down. At least this… creates something. Ripping girls to pieces to forge them into bullets…"  
I carefully put my hand on her shoulder.  
"Akashi, I promise you I will never have you scrap a ship. Despite this, they`re still… people. They might be built in a factory but they have feelings. Its not right to honor them like this- if we ever lose someone, i`ll have them buried rather than this."  
She said nothing at first, but I could feel her tense up.  
"Naval headquarters won`t let you do that for long. They`re worth a lot of money, afterall. Burying them all is-"  
"If I lose someone, then that's a tragedy, not an inconvenience." I interrupted her, gripping her shoulder a bit. "Just because you`re built in a factory doesn´t mean you have no right to be treated with ethics. If you have feelings, then people should respect them."  
"Should, yes." She muttered, quiet. "They should. But they don't."  
We were quiet for a little while, I let that sink in, and it seemed she did the same, before she gave it a little nod, and touched my hand.  
"… you`re an okay guy, Yamamoto." She whispered, not showing her face to me. "It might be… not so bad to serve here in this fleet if you can live up to those words…"  
I gave her a nod as well. "I promised you this, and i`ll keep it, no matter what. I already love those three like my own family- they`re special to me, each and every one of them. It wouldn`t be right to.. do this to them."  
"Alright, alright, I got it." Akashi said in return, bringing up her voice in a failing attempt to be tough about it. "The girl should be about done now."  
In the briefest of moments as she turned around, I could see her face- it was red, and her cheeks glistered wet.  
So, they could even cry, huh…

Then my breath stopped as I saw the rectangular lid open up, and expose the girl inside… from just the looks, you wouldn`t be able to tell the difference between a regular girl and a shipgirl, as had discovered at that very moment. Shoulder length, pinkish-purple hair, pale but healthy complexion, small green eyes… she even had a belly button, as unnecessary as that was for someone built in a factory.  
Oh, and she was completely and entirely naked, which made me turn around just after I had gotten a few glances at her body. …Very anatomically correct, indeed. My lower half agreed.  
"….Whats with this guy, doc?" I heard her say, and felt a finger pointed at me. She sounded… disinterested, which made me wonder why.  
"How would I know? And dammit, i´m a repairman, not a doctor. Put some clothes on, i`m sure the fairies are done with that by now- you`re getting the poor guy all embarrassed."  
"I`m not… embarrassed.." I brought out, clearly embarrassed. "I just find its more appropriate if I don´t watch you dress. We haven`t even been introduced yet, afterall."  
Akashi poked my shoulder.

"Then why do you insist on being here to begin with, huh? I told you to wait in your office, smartass." Damn, she caught me.

"So that's our commander, huuuh. Doesn´t seem like a lot." Oh, this brat behind me was talking. Taking a breath, I turned around again, and found her bend over forward, just now putting on her socks… and whilst showing off a lot of cleavage, I also got a good look at her back. I tried my hardest to ignore it, and pump up some authority as I saluted.  
"You guessed correctly. Lieutenant Commander Shichiro Yamamoto, your commander." I introduced myself, trying not to flinch as the girl poked me straight underneath the ribcage. She reached me to about my shoulder, petite. I guess that's to be expected from a destroyer.  
"LT-CMD, huh. No wonder he blushes." Damn it, I was blushing too?! "Shiranui. Kageru class. I look forward to your guidance."  
So formal, and yet so… what was the word? Something with T. Its like she didn`t even mind being naked, so long as she could destroy my authority with it.  
"Likewise, I look forward to working with you, Shiranui. Meet me in the office after you finish, there`s a few things we need to take care of first."  
"Whatever."  
W…whatever? Now it was like she was bored with me. Either way, I decided to play it cool, and do as I announced. Heading to my office, back through the corridors of the very empty base… I wondered if it would always be as empty as this.  
Then I ran into someone, face first.  
"Ugh!" I gave off, and again I was embarrassed for not looking, but who was it now? The person I ran into, a tall brunette with below-shoulder-length hair, didn´t even budge from the impact. She turned and smiled at me, scratching the back of her head.  
"O-oh? You must be my commander then. Here, let me help you up." Her hand gripped the back of my shirt, and a powerful yank brought me back up. Not exactly gentle either.  
"Th-thanks, I guess. Who are you? I didn`t expect anyone else so soon." The response was a smile, as that powerful hand let go of me.  
"I`m USS Maryland! The Pacific Forces of the USA`d like to have an eye on the Japanese, so the naval headquarters selected this base for it! Just treat me like everyone else though, I don´t wanna be special!"  
….Headquarters was a bunch of assholes, that way. Not just Admiral Moran, it seemed even Fleet Admiral Natsume hated me.

Meanwhile, unaware to me, something else happened underneath the sea.

* * *

"So, the new one… arrived at their base… right?" Anchorage Princess rubbed her temples, suffering from a minor migraine due to the sisters debate from earlier on. It seemed they were still dissatisfied with Nazara`s decision to have them be lead into victory by an Admiral… the same one, Chelsey Nimitz… as more and more people dared to call her by now, much to her displeasure.  
"Seems that way. The bug we planted in her reports she has arrived, and is currently inside their base." Admiral Nimitz responded, looking at a tablet computer displaying the current position. "I look forward to her report… after five expeditions in a row, this guy has not suffered any losses whatsoever…"  
"They can`t say… the same about you." Anchorage teased, prodding her in the side, receiving a glare. "Well, perhaps… she will clarify… what his secret is, if there is… one at that."  
The woman dressed in black nodded, tucking the computer away for now. "They haven`t given me a fleet yet, so don`t judge me. It seems as if Midway and the others still argue about it. How am I supposed to show my potential and worth without being able to?"  
"You could start… by speaking to them… more respectfully. They have… been doing your job… for years now." Anchorage glanced at her, although much less harsher than most of the others did. "They will trust… you very soon. You`ll see."  
"Hmpf. I guess you´re right. I haven´t really been able to converse with them at all yet… somehow, they`re all busy with something else, and I don`t get what Battleship´s assistant Wo is saying either."  
She twitched, feeling a hand on her shoulder, massaging it with clawed fingers.  
"The Wo-class carriers… have their own, unique language… as do all lower Abyssals. Every … octave is its own word… a different pitch is a different sentence entirely… it is hard to understand… and almost impossible to speak. But be assured… she understands you. Every word."  
Admiral nodded. "I see. Then its best not to talk about secrets in her direct vicinity, right?"  
A reply never came, as doors in front of them were opened the next moment.  
That these doors even opened as easily as they did was only possible due to the watertight nature of the Abyssal base Deep Delta Seven, DD7 for short- a gigantic underground complex located a hundred meters below the ocean floor, with a system of elevators for fleet deployment, retrieval and airlocking, several hundred meters in diameter. There were no windows anywhere in the base, everything was a very plain, steel clad – much like the guts of a large ship`s hull. Despite this, it was lit and well kept with no rust anywhere. It was divided into four sections- The first and biggest section was the hangar, two hundred meters long, where destroyers, cruisers and aircraft carriers docked for supplies, repairs, remodeling. Fully automated machines built spare parts and ammunition, work drones with no intelligence of their own put them to use. The second section was the resource storage- in itself divided into two parts, where one was dedicated to solid resources such as fuel, steel and bauxite, the other half mainly consisted of shipgirl bodies that were retrieved from the ocean floor, and scheduled either to be scrapped for materials or used to build new Abyssals. The third section was the midmost one- well armored and deeper submerged than the others, this section was designed as a war room. This was where the Princesses looked over holographic displays of maps, higher ranked Abyssals discussed the new findings and information and plans were made to attack and defend- this entire section was electromagnetically sealed, no phone signal, sonar or depth radars would find them here.  
The fourth and final section was like a dormitory- while lesser Abyssals required no beds to rest, and slept in the hangar, the Princesses, demons and the Admiral were to sleep here- this was the only section with any sort of livability to it, something which wasn`t dimly lit and plain, as the inhabitants were allowed to decorate their rooms as they liked. Of course, it was hard to do so when everything had to be acquired from the surface…  
The doors that had opened revealed Aircraft Carrier Demon, crossing her armor-clad arms in front of the Admiral, and a few lower ships waited behind her.  
"Nazara has deemed you… ready for your first deployment. Do not disappoint us." She said briefly, glancing at Admiral Nimitz.  
She gritted her teeth in return, and tried to take Anchorage`s advice."I won`t. Please have faith in me, Carrier. Whichever task it is Nazara chooses for me, I will perform it along with you."  
It worked, to some extent, as the face of the humanoid carrier cleared up and she nodded, gesturing over to the war room. "We have received… our orders already. Review them… and then decide what we should do."

* * *

Back in the office, I took a seat behind my desk, rested my eyes for a moment as they felt dry from the heat in the factory, and looked up to face the two girls in front of me.

The pink-purple haired one in a cute, practical outfit, Shiranui.  
The brunette in an American sailor`s uniform, hat included, Maryland.  
The two newest additions to our fleet, and something rubbed me the wrong way about both of them… Maryland, especially. I´d just gotten the papers regarding the transfer… three hours after she arrived. Americans normally didn´t work this fast… either this was something way over my head, or… something was off. I decided to remain quiet about it and spoke up.  
"Alright, you two. We`re expecting a battleship to arrive tomorrow, and we`ll need to establish that the flow of resources is stable and secure. The rest of the fleet is still out at sea, patrolling and retrieving some fuel and steel, but later today we`ll head out to an outpost in the Solomon sea."  
"So?" Shiranui interrupted, tilting her head. "That's a field trip, right? I´ll go pack up the picknick basket."  
"Shhh. Let him finish." Maryland gave off, which only served to interrupt even more.  
I glanced at both of them. "Its not a field trip. Shortly after the fleet departed, all communications with the base were lost. Seismic activity suggests multiple explosions, perhaps a battle- spy satellites can only see a a blackened cloud, like from a fire… we don`t know if the Abyss is involved, their vessels are too small to be picked up by pictures like those."  
"Oh." Said both of them at the same time, looked at each other, and i`m pretty sure they thought the same thing I did.  
"They were probably annihilated then." Shiranui, bluntly, put it the best. I nodded.  
"That's what the higher ups think, too. Originally, we were going to hand over patrolling and defending these resource stations over to them… but this turned into a search and rescue operation by the looks of it. We`ll depart as soon as the first fleet returns- there`s no time to lose. I`ll come along too, some of the girls will likely need repairs or supplies."  
"…You sure? I wasn`t going to ask, but your eye looks-" I cut off Shiranui by putting my finger on her lips.  
"That was Tenryuu punching me in the face, not an Abyssal. I would be a lot more proud about it if I got into a fist fight with a Princess."  
"…but either way you were punching a girl…" Maryland threw in, and I sighed, leaning back into my chair and taking a sip of coffee. "Maryland. That –Girl- can bend steel bars with her hands, is made of metal and wears shorts. I think she can handle it. By the way… Maryland is quite a mouth full."  
The battleship blinked. "Is it?"  
A nod from me. "Yeah- its fine if I just call you Mary, right? Sounds cuter anyways."  
It seemed as if she didn´t know what to think about that at first, looking down to the desk with a troubled impression, and slightly pink cheeks, while Shiranui… made a dark grimace that included a grin.  
"Ooooh? So, will you call me Nuinui then? Go ahead. I dare you. Call me something cutesy…"

"First fleet is baaaack." Tenryuu called out, punching the door open as they entered, putting a stop to that conversation BEFORE Shiranui would do something she`d hopefully regret. However… they returned in a state I didn`t expect. While there was little in the way of physical injury, the clothes they were… got mangled, to say the least, Unryuu was trying to tie a knot into her ripped top, Tenryuu had a few grazes here and there which even had a few reddened spots, as if she had been bleeding, Maruyu hid behind the other two in attempt not to be seen at all. I swallowed, felt my face grow warm and nodded. "Alright… you look like you went into quite a bit of trouble, what happened?"  
"The Abyss is what happened, ya genius." Tenryuu grumbled, a few sparks coming from her headgear… it had a bullet hole in it. Outch.  
"….so why is only your clothes…?" I rubbed my forehead, a bit dumbstruck. Akashi mentioned something…  
"We regenerate on our own." Unryuu responded, after she gave up trying to fix her top, and simply held it there with an arm. "Although it makes us feel tired and heavy, our bodies can fix themselves. Of course, our clothes and equipment are not part of our bodies… so they will need to be fixed otherwise…"  
"Makes sense. Listen, which one of you is still capable of putting up a fight? We´ll need to depart this instant for a rescue operation. I´m expecting enemy activity there, so if you feel too tired to fight, stay here and dock first.."  
As if on instinct, Tenryuu´s arm shot up and she put up a stern grimace. "I`ll fight some more…! I still got some fire left in me, Admiral…!" … good god, she could be cute, without even trying to be. But truth to be told, she did look fitter than Unryuu, who seemed even more tired than usual. Combined with the fact that Maruyu was probably even worse off damaged than ususal…  
"Alright, good. Mary, Shiranui, Tenryuu, head down to the dock, i`ll follow after I gathered some fairies- we might encounter some damaged shipgirls when we`re there. Be there in five."  
"Aye aye."

Boarded with about twenty repair fairies, some spare resources and the usual loadout, my patrol boat departed, being the rear of our T-formation, with Shiranui and Tenryuu being the left and right side, and Maryland being in front of me… her massive rig nearly took away my sight, so we switched pretty soon, but… I wasn`t sure if I that had been a good idea afterall. Something rubbed me the wrong way, something felt… bad.  
"So, what do you think happened, Admiral?" Tenryuu asked, scooting along. "An accident, or an attack?"  
"Who knows at this point." I sighed. "Could be either, or both. Or something we would never have thought about… that's why I prepared for everything I can think of."  
Slowly we approached what the radar told me was the island, but I could only see a pillar of smoke on the horizon, polluting the nearby sky with blackness. As we drew closer, I started to notice why…. The island was flat. Completely flat. No buildings, trees, hangars or installations- it seemed everything that was on it had been burnt to the ground with something hotter than normal fire. Napalm, maybe, or even thermite…  
"Oh, holy fucking…" I heard Tenryuu say, then looked ahead, and wish I didn`t. Surrounding the island was a multitude of body parts, some of them sparking, others drifting dead in the water- from time to time, torsos or heads drifted by, leaving no question that those bodies used to be shipgirls… some of them were bleeding too much though… humans, likely.  
"Good god… what happened here…?" I asked myself, while Shiranui and Maryland remained was bothered, but held herself together like the veteran she was… I slowed down the engines as we approached closer, not wanting to damage the screw if a hand or something got caught inside it…. I reached into the water, feeling around in it, until my hand hit something metallic, small, box shaped. Instinctively, I pulled it out- the next second every single fibre of my body froze, I was unable to breathe, ice ran in my veins and for a moment, my heart didn`t make a single beat.  
That box… was a small, plain hexagon, with burnt tubes coming out of it, the front pierced by what seemed like a small shell, or a fragment. That was… that CCU… The heart of a shipgirl… drifting dead in the water, with a hole in it…  
Panicking, I threw it back into the water and got back behind the wheel, kicking up the engine as it roared… I could swear Tenryuu was yelling something after me, but I heard none of it… nothing until a fairy slapped me in the face, and pointed into the water.  
There was a whole body, the eyes still open… long blonde hair, a red, grey and black patterned uniform with holes torn into it, singed in several places… With my hands still trembling, I reached to the water- I nearly cried out when another hand touched mine, weakly grasping it.  
With the combined strength of myself, that shipgirl and the fairies, we managed to lift her into the boat and accessed the damage- well, at least she still had all limbs attached, even though she was missing her boots and one of her socks, kept muttering something about rudder damage, most of it in a foreign language, and had several dozen smaller impacts all over her uniform. She seemed too weak to even sit up, understandable in her situation, but it seemed like she was going to make it through…

…then the ocean became black in front of us, and a multitude of Abyssals rose from it.  
Seven Ha-class destroyers. Four I-class destroyers, a humanoid abyssal with white hair, dressed in armor and sitting on a giant piece of rigging, where a multitude of flying balls rose up from, and.. a human, standing on the back end of it. …Was it a human? She was staring at me with red eyes, her arms tightly crossed- her uniform was much like mine, except in a black shade of color with golden accents- long black hair came down her averagely sized body, which seemed to have no shape within the baggy nature of the uniform. She continued to glare, while the Abyssal in front of her stepped aside to let her come forth- as she did, I could see that she was armed, with an American Colt pistol on the right side and what appeared to be an old navy saber on the other. Naturally, I left my Taisho at home in the hurry I was in, and I didn`t have a gun with me either… except for those machine guns mounted on the boat, which couldn´t angle that high up.  
"Tactical retreat." I ordered, pressing it out under my breath. We couldn´t win against this fleet, and I didn`t want to risk any unnecessary deaths. This place had seen enough death already.  
"W-what?!" Tenryuu spat out, turning her head to me, but I glared back.  
"Tactical retreat! Didn`t you hear me the first time?! Back to port, full speed!"  
The red eyes of their commander glared at me, I could feel them even when we turned around in a boxed formation…  
"Carrier. Chase them down." I heard a soft, but nevertheless cruel voice say… planes started from the massive rig they were standing on, and the enemy destroyers started to chase us as well.  
"Tch… Tenryuu, Shiranui, fire torpedos at the enemy to hold them off! Maryland, anti air turrets!"  
Mary seemed a bit… shocked at this order, but after a glance from me did as I ordered- the smaller turrets on her rig turned to the aircraft and started firing, time fuzes exploding in midair and causing damage to the abyssal jets chasing us.

Two explosions, two planes were shot down… I could hear Tenryuu`s guns booming in my ear, seems like she gave off a few shots just to keep them away even further.. then, a series of much more potent, louder bangs made me duck my head down- Marylands main guns had fired at the enemy as well, likely sinking a few of them.

I didn`t look. I steered on straight ahead, feeling the damaged shipgirl hold onto my leg like her life depended on it, which did more than enough to make me press onward. The home port was just two hours away, we could shake them off, then we would-  
A hole appeared in my windscreen, another the controls of the boat, then… blood sprayed over them, and I could feel my fingers clenching onto the wheel. My air was gone, I couldn`t breath in or out, my chest felt rigid all of the sudden- then, sharp, undiluted, pure pain hit me, what little air remained in my lungs was pressed out in a pained grunt.  
One of the aircraft had hit me. I got shot. Figures, because afterall, I was stupid enough to be on the front lines even though I didn`t have to. It only served me right to be punished for doing things differently. Still… I felt myself pressing on, never letting go- like a drug, adrenaline caused me to go beyond my limits. If I would stop, that girl clutching my leg might die. I would definitely die, and the girls behind me, holding off the enemy fleet with a few shots here and there…

My memory cuts off here, the next thing I remembered was at the factory. Akashi was fixing up my wound, muttering curses and insults out to me, while the shipgirl next to me was being put together by fairies.  
"…You have my thanks, Japanese. Mein Kommandant died protecting my fellow companions, my home has been lost to flames. For saving my life, it is only natural that I, Bismarck, offer my services to you." The blonde shipgirl said, pridefully touching her chest at this, and the only thing I brought out was a grunt... it took a few moments before I could respond in full.  
"I would`ve done this for anyone, Bismarck. But I appreciate it, of course. …i`m… Shichiro.. Hgn… Yamamoto, not 'Japanese', though."  
She raised an eyebrow at this.  
"You`re not? I was assuming that, with the black hair, the uniform, the Schlitzaugen-"  
"No, no, I am a Japanese man, of course. I was just saying, that's not my name."  
"….Oh. I see. Very well, I was mistaken. …I presume you´re going to ask me about the attack, ja?"  
I managed a nod. "That`d be helpful. I need to report this to headquarters."

"There is not much I can say. From one moment to another, the sea turned black, and the Abyssal fleet emerged. They started a Bombardierung, both shelling us from the coast as well as dropping… fire bombs, I would assume, from airplanes. A single bomb caused steel and stone to melt, and trees to catch fire." Bismarck`s eyes became distant. "I was in the magazine back then, underground, I only came up when the base was already burning down. Kommandant Mengelmann was holding onto Scharnhorst, who`d lost a leg, and told me to hold them off until help arrives- I did not manage to do so."  
"You survived, though. So either luck is on your side, or you´re quite good at what you do." I smiled at her, which caused her to huff out in frustration.  
"Luck and myself are not on speaking terms, Herr Yamamoto. I suppose I am skillful, sinking the worlds biggest battlecruiser with just one broadside, but I sank during my first mission. ….still, you can praise me more. It makes me feel a bit better."  
I chuckled. "Will do, as soon as talking stops to hurt. Welcome to the fleet, Bismarck."  
"Danke. I appreciate it."

* * *

"So, the boy escaped..?" Midway asked, her arms crossed as she listened to the results.  
"Yes, although one of Aircraft Carrier Demons planes managed to injury him. He ran off as soon as he saw us, and we were fresh out of bombs and torpedos." Nimitz responded, nodding lightly. "Our total losses include four aircraft and two destroyers, both of which sank during the assault on the base. We`ve counted thirty seven sunken ships, thirteen dead humans, and a blind number of ships and humans buried under the rubble of the base."  
Midway nodded in response, neither pleased nor angered. "Good. An acceptable result for a first mission. Admiral Hegelmann –"  
"Mengelmann." Carrier corrected, clearing her throat.  
"Whatever. The german Admiral will no longer pose a threat to our transport ships, which is good. Still, we have much more humans to exterminate. What about our spy?"  
"She confirms Yamamoto to be injuried, although not fatally. Apperantly, they rescued one survivor, and they expect a Yamato-class Battleship tomorrow." Admiral Nimitz responded, holding back her displeasure about Midway`s lack of enthusiasm. Carrier then put a hand on her commanders shoulder, causing Nimitz to raise an eyebrow.  
"Midway is hard to impress. The rest of us isn´t. You did well, Admiral." She whispered, giving a fangy grin, before removing that hand again.  
"I suppose." Regaining composure, Nimitz straightened her uniform. "Whats the next step, Midway?"  
"That is up to you, Admiral. My agenda merely concerns Midway Station… you may plan and execute as you wish. I no longer have objections." She glared at the holographic map in the war room, pointing at a small island in the pacific. "My revenge draws near. Until then… I would appreciate it if you kept them busy. That is all."

* * *

_**A/N**: This concludes chapter four- and did you notice the length of the chapters keeps increasing? I´ve set myself this challange, trying to make each chapter at least 1500 words longer than the last. Additionally, the final chapter is supposed to have a 20.000 word length- more than three times longer than this one! I am insane. Still, I like challanges, and this fic is very amusing to write- it helps me to get all those shipgirl ideas out of my head when nobody wants to play RPGs with me._

_Incidentally, this fic is also based on an RPG- its a prequel to a Kancolle RPG i`ve been playing for six months nearly everyday. Finally, you may have noticed the rating went up- because Yamamoto had found out about the sexiness of shipgirls, which may lead to some... interesting situations. If actual sex will be involved- who knows, but i`m pretty sure we´ll get to that at some point. For now- next week, Musashi joins the team._

_Hopefully next week, these chapters keep getting longer and i only have a limited amount of time to write._


	6. Tension at the homeport

„DD7 calling Behemoth. Requesting response."  
„Behemoth understands. Report your findings."  
„Enemy battleship transport has successfully avoided anti-aircraft fire. It remains unstopped. Current location of the transport is unknown."  
„We understand. Punish those responsible and carry on with fleet operations. It is of little difference if they are destroyed at sea or above it."  
„DD7, copy that."

Admiral Nimitz was less than pleased about this, circling the holographic map of the war room in restlessness. "So… how exactly did they manage to get behind a 15 mile thick shield of anti aircraft guns that we erected around Okinawa…?"  
"Reports from the unit… say the aircraft was very small… the size of a humanoid, carrying some sort of… aerodynamic pod, likely the cargo." Aircraft Carrier Demon responded, looking over a tablet computer with the data displayed.  
"Humanoid…? A drone isn`t that nimble." Nimitz responded, clenching her fists while still pacing up and down.  
"No, not a… drone, but perhaps… something similar to a shipgirl…" She looked up, tilting her head slightly to the side. "The americans have.. experimented with this before…"  
"And we don`t have anything like it? Isn`t the Abyss miles ahead when it comes to technology?"  
Carrier shrugged. "Nazara never deemed it… necessary. His priority was to establish… a safe route over the sea…"  
"How is something that will gain us air superiority not necessary? That's insane. Nazara should know better than this." Grunting a bit, she finally stopped pacing around the room and folded her hands. "Make sure we´ll start developing a humanoid-based fighter within the next twelve hours. If they start using them now, then we`ll need something to shoot them down reliably… after that we move on to bombers and parasite aircraft, maybe flying aircraft carriers… we`re not limited to the sea this way." Nimitz gave her a nod, and Carrier responded with one of her own, starting to... smile. She didn´t know when she last smiled, if ever, but after initial doubts their commander began to bloom and rise to the challenge, exceeding her expectations. For her the experiment concerning a human commander was a full success, but… Midway was not interested in it, and Nazara had his doubts as well. If she was aware of this, perhaps even the Queen was skeptical. But with time, hopefully they would trust her too.. who knows, maybe one day the entire Abyss would follow Admiral Nimitz.

After I had spent the night at Akashi`s workshop, being patched back together and injected… things, I finally got back to my office, to my coffee, and the… problematic day that would be ahead of me.  
Thankfully, breakfast was made as I arrived, so after regaining some strength, I summoned the shipgirls to my office to discuss the next steps.  
"Alright, girls, today Musashi arrives, and with her come a new set of objectives. Since our fleet has grown so much, I would like to reassign the posts of you guys, as well as change the fleet composition." I began, folding my hands while Unryuu brought in the onigiri she made. An odd choice for breakfast, but she made it for me, so I didn´t complain… by the looks of it, she made a few for the others as well, too. "Bismarck, i`d like to put you on office duty for now. We didn`t plan for three battleships at once, and our supply situation isn`t secure yet… so for now, I would like you to be my secretary."  
Bismarck gave me a nod. "Jawohl, Herr Admiral. I understand completely- spending some time in the home port will help familiarize myself with it, too." Well, glad we cleared that up.  
"Shiranui, you´ll be in charge of the communications room for now. We`ll need to stay informed of the situation, now that our closest ally is no more. If an attack comes to us, we´ll be ready."  
"Hooray. I get to put a gun in my mouth before the Abyss gets to us." Everyone looked at Shiranui in a bewildered manner, and she started to grin. "Kidding, kidding."  
"….ANYWAY, moving on." I cleared my throat, seriously wondering about Shiranui`s mental state. "Tenryuu, you´ll be in charge of training drills. You`ll also be the flagship of the first fleet for the time being."  
"R-really?! Awesome! Hell yeah, did you hear that, Nui? I`m the flagship- OW!"  
"Don`t. Call me Nui. We`re not girlfriends, Ten-chan". The pink haired one responded, while the purple cruiser held her nose that had been flicked.  
I glared at them. "Hey! Hey, take it outside, girls. We`re still in the meeting. Either way, Maruyu, you`re our transport ship, so you take care of the postal services. We`re expecting some shipments this week, so that's an important job too.. finally, Mary…"  
…I looked at the Brunette, and she looked at me, tilting her head with a questioning smile.  
"….I´ve got nothing. Well, I didn`t plan for you either, and I don´t know how long the US forces will keep you here, so… uh, morale officer, I suppose? Or you could just keep me informed of the things happening in the base." Had I known about her whereabouts earlier then I wouldn`t have said that. Nevertheless, she raised her hand enthusiastically and grinned. "I can do both! Leave it to me, Admiral!"  
"Alright, good… then everyone, do your best today. We can still change your jobs out later if things don't work out, but for now let`s make sure we`re ready for our guest."  
They looked at me, until Tenryuu scratched the back of her head with a faint, insecure laugh.  
"Ahaha… uh. Shit. I forgot to tell you. She`s here already."  
I stared back at her, dumbstruck. "W-what?!"  
"Y-yeah… she´s down in the lobby, waiting for this meeting to finish…" She still continued to laugh, making me even more ticked off. Seriously, that was a bad first impression for an outsider..! I was already beyond embarrassed when I crashed into Mary the other day, and now this..?  
"…Meetings finished. I`ll be with you in a moment, Bismarck. …Damnit, Tenryuu."  
Jumping up, I hastily went out of the room and down into the lobby to make up for the lost time, but what I saw was not what I expected, at all. I wasn´t sure what I was expecting, but I didn`t expect her to sit there, her guns still strapped on (Which were colossal, I had to admit, the whole rig was bigger than anything i`d ever seen!) and played games on a handheld. ...I had no words, until I eventually brought myself to go over to the bronze-skinned woman and extend my hand for a greeting.  
"You must be Musashi! I`m the commander of this base, Shichiro Ya…mamoto.." I briefly stumbled over my own words, seeing her piercing glare directed to me, then she stood up, towering over me with that gigantic rigging. Without her high heels, she would still be a bit taller than me, and it didn't help that she carried the weight of a car on her back. I felt like a looming shadow was cast over me, before she adjusted the half-rimmed glasses she wore and huffed, speaking up at last.  
"Hmf. You surely made me wait a while. Very well. The second ship of the Yamato-class, Musashi, has arrived."  
I wanted to say many things. So many things. But under the pressure of that piercing glare, and at the sight of her body, all words died in my throat… the difference between her and the rest of the ships in my fleet was stellar, to say the least. Not just her mocca skin color, but i`ve never seen a ship so… physically fit before. Her arms, legs and abs looked like she went to the gym every evening and didn´t leave until midnight…. Well, it wasn´t that bad. But one could easily see the outlines and subtle bumps of her muscles… pairing that with a rack bigger even than Unryuu or Bismarck (Whom, I hadn`t mentioned, was quite the looker herself), the fact that she was so tall and wore so little, and that piercing glare (Have I mentioned that?), I was unable to bring out words, only single letters that bore no sense.  
"As expected! I`ve went from a base I was not welcome in to one with an incompetent leader... My luck is not the best, it seems." Musashi grunted, snapping around as Unryuu poked her side.  
"Don`t be like that, Musashi… we`re friendly, and we worked hard to be able to keep you here…" She smiled, placing a hand on her wrist. "Let me show you to your bunk… and give the Admiral a few moments to recover."  
"Hmpf. Very well then." Musashi`s glare finally left me, and with it, I could breathe again... looking after them, it took me several minutes to get moving again, and it wasn`t on my own accord, but Tenryuu giving me a slap on the back.  
"Oi, that don`t seem good. What's with her?" Thank you, Captain Obvious. Still, i`d rather have her right now than someone who glared like this.  
"….Seems as if she doesn`t like me…" I retorted, then I swallowed, slowly moving back to the office.  
Tenryuu followed, seemingly a bit worried. "That I can tell, yeah. …shit, i`ve never seen you this scared before since that time when you freaked out about a broken CCU."  
"Tenryuu..! If you keep reminding me of that, i`ll put you on kitchen duty!" My head turned to her in a snap, but the same moment I shook it. "…Sorry, nevermind. Just… a little bit on the edge just now."  
Taken aback by my earlier threat, she took a moment to recover, before nodding slowly."Yeah, you`re lookin` the part. Why don´t you take a bath or something? Something to take your mind off of it, cuz we need you in top form." Genuine concern filled her face, in such a way I hadn`t seen before. Did our sparring from before leave such an impression of me?  
"Don´t want to. There`s so much more to do, I don`t have time for a long bath right now, I need to-"  
She gripped my arm to stop me there and glare lightly, making me swallow hard again.  
"Don´t give me that crap, Admiral. Bisko can do that… she`s got a lot more endurance than you`ll ever have. Take care of your body before it breaks, damn you."  
"…But I don`t-" I began, only to be cut off again.  
"What? Ya scared?! Scared to bathe alone or something? I`d wash your back, you know. It's only natural for a subordinate." God damn it, Tenryuu, you`re making me blush here…!  
"I… I don´t… I`m not even.." I began, but… what was I supposed to say..? That could so easily lead to accidents, it was insane…!  
And what was even more insane was her pull on my arm, as she went straight for the bathroom designated for officers.  
"Don`t be such a wuss, man!"

A wuss I was, because I started to shiver when we entered the bath. Not because of the chilly air, but… we were essentially going to bathe together. Me, and that girl I knew for... what, two weeks now? I swallowed a dry lump in my throat, slowly, carefully.  
"Tenryuu… lock the door. Goodness, don´t forget to lock the door. If anyone catches wind of this…"  
She raised an eyebrow in return, as if expecting me to finish that sentence, before doing as I asked and closing the door, turning the key twice. "There, ya wuss. What are you getting fidgety about, huh?" She then turned on the warm water and let the bathtub fill up- needless to say the tub was comfortably sized, but nowhere near as big as the bathhouse found in the dock area, which was essentially a remodeled shower room from the school days of this installation.  
"…You don`t get it, do you. A man and a woman bathing together, especially those who aren`t related… its... it's quite a different feeling from bathtime with your parents, you know…?"  
My explanation left her confused and even more misunderstanding. "I don't have parents, ya know."  
Oh, right. …I kept forgetting those girls weren`t humans, they… they were so much like humans, except… except I felt attracted to them, unlike with your average human woman…  
"Aw, hell, just stop standing there like you´re about to be crucified, man. Strip down and let some water wash over…. You…"  
She stopped talking as I closed my eyes tightly and started taking off my shirt, tossing it aside along with my cap, the undershirt following suit. "W…woah, what… what is…?!" Seems like the feeling was starting to hit her, there. As I managed to open my eyes again, I noticed her face had gotten completely red, same as her lights up above on her headgear, which began to move a bit randomly.  
"Tenryuu, uhm…" I began, collecting words. "If we´re going to do this, maybe its best if we… face each other back to back." I received a nod, and soon enough, we both turned around.  
Taking off my shoes and socks I didn`t think much… even though seeing Tenryuu´s shirt drop to the ground made me tremble, I didn´t fully realize the problem until I undid my belt and brought down the pants.  
Oh, mommy. My underwear had turned into an indian tent, with a single pole in the middle. Crap, how would I explain this…? I should…  
"Tenryuu?" Just be honest about it. "There`s.. a problem."  
"W-what is it now, huh? Ya scared, again?" Her voice trembled, and in a way, this reassured me- she was having second thoughts about this too.  
"Lets… lets just stop this silly idea, okay…? No need to wash my back, or even bathe with me…"  
"We got this far, you know…! M..Man up and go all the way!" She yelled back, which started to make me fear someone might hear us and get the wrong idea. Briefly, my back touched hers – bare skin against bare skin, and blood shot straight into my crotch, making me wince. "That's not the issue here, Tenryuu…! You do know what happens when men and women tend to hang out together naked..?"  
"They get incredibly awkward like we do?"  
I started to chuckle, but it only helped so much. "More often than not they get turned on by the body of the other person."  
"…..Oh. A-and…? Wh-whats your point?"  
"That's what happened to me just now." That felt like a rock falling straight on my chest, and by face burned up. I could tell the same was the case for her, as silence was the answer for that.  
"….Whatever." She finally brought out. "Its your body that's doing it, right? So… whatever. I`ll ignore it."  
Wow. Just… wow. One chance to defuse this situation and instead she let the bomb blow. Was she TRYING to get into my pants or something? … I did start to get that feeling, that our friendship started to become something… deeper for her. I wasn`t sure what to think of that… she was attractive, very much so, but as far as I knew I didn´t feel anything for her… Or did i? Who knows.  
"… Alright then." I muttered slightly, getting out of my boxer shorts to rid myself of the last remaining article of clothing. "I`m done. Did you think of getting some towels beforehand?"  
"…" Her silence was a no. "Of course I did, stupid, why would i…" Yes, definitely a no. "….I forgot." Told you. It brought a grin to my face, and I crossed my arms, a tiny bit more confident than before.  
"So how do we get in the bathtub…?" Tenryuu asked, making me chuckle even more.  
"I`ll go there first, and I won`t look, then you go." Said and done, easy. The water was warm, nice, comforting, and I could feel my tense muscles relax as I closed my eyes to keep with my promise not to look… only to tense again when Tenryuu slipped in as well, in a graceful movement without splashes. My eyes opened again, and I released a breath.  
"W..what now?" She interpreted that as an annoyed sigh, by the sound of things.  
"Nothing. But, if you´re asking… did you plan this beforehand, that things turn out like this..?"  
In response to this, I felt her jolt in the water, like a heavy duty twitch. "W-what?! All I wanted was for you to relax and relieve some stress, you were the one who agreed that I should wash your back..!"  
"You suggested that, though." I gave back.  
"Admiral! S-shut up…!"  
A snicker later, another question came up in my head.  
"Tenryuu."  
"What is it now?!"  
"So, whats the point of bathing together like this if we`re facing each other back to back..? You can`t wash my back like this. And if my assumption is true, then its still pointless because you can`t see me naked like this."  
Oh holy crap, this was turning out to be so much fun. I could practically feel the water boil around Tenryuu from the heat of her embarrassment.  
"Wh…who said I wanted to..?! …Mhm."  
"You do, don`t you? I didn´t realize that, but… you didn`t… see a man naked so far, right?"  
"Shut it… shut up already, i… mmm." She mumbled something I couldn`t understand.  
"Huh? What was that?"  
"….yeah." She did? Was that was she was saying? "Yeah. I…I was looking forward to seeing your body, okay? Now will you shut up?"  
"I`m just asking, geez. Don`t be so stiff. Relax, Ten-chan."  
"…There you go calling me Ten-chan again…."  
I chuckled. "Its an addiction, I can´t help it. …Well. Its embarrassing to do it alone… If you turn around, too, then i´ll turn around and let you see." A daring move from me, but… somehow, the atmosphere seemed right to proceed further.  
"Wha… r-really… but, uh, we can`t turn around sitting in the tub like this…"  
True. "Then lets stand up and turn around, that works right? Then we get a good look, and we can sit down again and actually get some bathing done." Twisted, vile thoughts bubbled up in the depths of my mind… I never knew I was capable of thoughts like these. When she would be standing there, she`d be vulverable- without equipment, and in surprise, I could bring her down and… explore her body a bit further than just with my eyes, perhaps… if she got into it, then…  
"F-fine. I`m not scared. Are you scared? Because i`m not. Lets do this. On three."  
"Alright. One."  
"You can still quit, ya know! ..T-two…"  
"Three!"  
With a splash, the two of us stood up at the same time and turned around, as if in a wild-west duel, and we instantly saw each other`s reddened faces. More so, I could see how cute Tenryuu was without her headgear, and she didn`t even wear an eyepatch, her damaged, scarred eye bare to the world- somehow, that made it even better. Still, the rest… her body was flawless, absolutely flawless- no signs of the damages she received in the past expeditions and small sorties, and her body wasn`t even on the same scale as Shiranui`s, who already took my breath away. Curves and outlines crafted by art, small details such as a mole I discovered, the lifelikeness of her nipples, stiffening up when exposed to air, water still running from the gentle curvature of her breasts and gathering in her belly button, in the middle of her taut stomach, with its small crevices of abs from her workouts... I kept expecting a blood vessel in my nose to pop, like in cheap Japanese mangas, but even when I found a glance at her southern regions, nothing happened… instead, I started to wonder if the lack of hair there was for the sake of asthetics or a budgetary decision. I ignored it, and rather took a peek at the pink that was mostly hidden by her thighs. Was she... horny too?  
I could feel her gaze lingering on me as well, and it was for the better neither of us said anything as two virgins, me and Tenryuu, had first-time-contact with the other gender. A reassuring glance into her eye later, one of her hands guided itself toward my body, and I responded in the same way, reaching for her hips.

Then, one of the grates on the wall popped open, and Shiranui somehow managed to pop her head out of the ventilation shaft.  
"Admiraaaal. Its Sunday. Lets go to the beach."  
What followed was the display of the fastest i`ve ever seen someone jump out of a bathtub and punch a person in the face, with such force that I was sure Shiranui came out the other end of that shaft.

Chelsey Nimitz meanwhile was getting a show she didn`t expect, as Midway had asked her to come to the dock… to the factory of the DD7. There, build drones- mindless, identical husks of former shipgirls- took one of the corpses from the pile, strapping it onto a table, which was then tilted up, as machinery came from it. The dimly lit area gave this whole sight a spooky appearance, a corpse hanging from leather straps with robotic arms coming from behind it.  
"Witness, the birth… of a new princess, Admiral." She cooed, her relentless eyes resting on the sight of the procedure, as circular saws attached to robotic arms came forth. "Recycle damaged tissue and components. Remove all other components. Reduce overall size by 30 percent. Reduce arms and legs by an additional 20 percent. Integrate horns into upper superstructure. Reassemble with internal armor." She commanded, her voice fast and precise, with no pauses inbetween, as the machines got moving- effecitively scrapping the former shipgirl in the restraint, taking apart bit by bit save for the head- then the circular saws got to work, literally cutting up the chassis by the requested 30 and 50 percent. Nimitz watched in both horror and silent fascination, the sawblades removing "unneeded" parts, then welding them back together and grinding them down… in the end, the chassis very much reminded of a child.  
"That's hardly an effective ship design… What are you planning to do, Midway?" Nimitz muttered under her breath, still watching the spectacle unfold.  
The white madwoman chuckled in response, her eyes softening with glee. "The humans have… a word for it. They call it… psychological warfare…"  
While drills digged into the skull, attaching fiberglass nerves, extremely sensitive and highly sophisticated before casting them in a hardened, black texture.  
"…I never actually asked, but… it looks like those horns have a purpose." Nimitz spoke up under her breath, trying to stomach the fact that she was watching… a child being born.  
"They let us hear underwater…. Hear our enemies, our allies... feel every ripple of the ocean… It is akin to… what dolphins and whales use." Midway chuckled again. "Go ahead… I am sure Carrier will like it… if you touch them without asking."  
"But she doesn´t have any." Nimitz responded, only to be answered by the singular shake of Midway´s head.

"She does, under that… hair she`s so proud of… they are quite tiny. I assume… she wants to compensate… for them with it." As Midway finished talking, the arms were finished with the chassis and then built the rest of the girl… while the process of adding muscles and sensory equipment was identical, the inner workings were quite different- CCU, food conversion and others were part of a singular, black-metal… root, one could call it, the CCU being a tree trunk with dozens of roots going throughout the girl. If hit, those roots could take over the function of the CCU for a while, increasing the survivability tenfold and more. The genitals were quite different as well- while seemingly identical to the shipgirl`s human analog, they contained a lot more than just sensors for pleasure… most prominently, a few dozen tiny containers of fluid, similar to the nanites flowing through the Abyssal`s physique, capable of making the one who ingested it their slave, as well as a defensive mechanism, a microscopic needle leading to a reservoir of highly toxic fluids, capable of killing a person in seconds… a feature introduced after the attempted interrogation of an Abyssal by an especially ruthless Admiral. Otherwise, the function was very similar… although advanced. Glands, small barriers and inner shapes, nubs and ripples made sure that one foolish enough to attempt and court an Abyssal would be stunned and amazed by the feeling, hopefully falling for her like the prey of a succubus.  
Finally, after all this had been completed completed, the girl was wrapped in Tyberium- akin to Organium, but more resistant to water pressure at the downside of being about as heat conductant as steel, and therefore quite cold. It was a single layer rather than two seperate ones for the shipgirls, as the veins were directly worked into the material.  
The procedure finished, and the long white hair of the girl flowed down her body as the robotic arms clad her in a sleeveless dress, mittens covering her hands. The straps clipped open themselves, dropping the girl onto her own feet.  
"Hello! I`m Northern Ocean Princess! But you can call me Hoppo. Are you my mommy?" The girl addressed the more than wierded-out Nimitz, who instead pointed at Midway.  
"N-no, I think Midway Princess here fits the description better." Upon suggesting that, however, Midway chuckled.  
"Me? Have you forgotten… I was made the same way? If anything… we are sisters… distant, half sisters. Her true mother would be… our Queen, but you can be… her foster parent."  
"WHAT?!" Nimitz called out, ignoring the hug she was receiving from Hoppo. "What is… are you… have you gone insane?! First you build a child to go to war with, then you make her my daughter all of the sudden..?!"  
A dark glance from Midway, glowing and piercing, was enough to shut her up, however upon closer inspection, the royal madwoman was quite amused.  
"I see, I see… Nazara`s plan has worked. You are… in fact, a human… the reaction you have… toward her appearance… attests it. Have you forgotten? She is… ageless, a machine, like all… of us. She simply looks… and acts like a girl."  
Admiral Nimitz gritted her teeth and balled her fists, anger and shame tinting her face red.  
"That is… quite an accomplishment… I wonder how we will… fare with a human in our command…"  
"Hoppo`s bored. Gimme a Zero!"

Back in my office, I slowly sank down into my seat and took a deep breath, letting that whole thing wash over me for a few moments… then, I picked up the reports of the day and started to look over the current situation, while Bismarck was filing away the reports of last week.  
Briefly looking over to her, I couldn´t help but paste that image i`d gotten of Tenryuu´s body on hers, but I quickly dismissed that thought. This wasn`t right to do, Bismarck had nothing to do with this… encounter, which would likely keep me awake at night. Then, I discovered something that made me chuckle a bit.

"Is there something on my face, Herr Admiral? You seem quite amused." She noticed me, but to my relief she didn`t see how I looked at her before.  
"Yes. Why are you walking around on your socks?" She left her boots behind, and I had an idea why. She proved me right a second later.  
"That's common courtesy in a Japanese household, is it not?"  
"Yes, in a household, Bismarck. This is a naval base." I chuckled again, seeing her stare and slowly flush red at the embarrassment, being pointed out like this. I tried my best to ease her mind again.  
"Don`t try and become Japanese, just because you´re here. It's fine to keep your habits and to just continue on as if nothing happened. No need to eat bauxite with chopsticks, you know, a fork does the same."  
"You can eat bauxite with a fork?"  
Bismarck raised an eyebrow at me, and I shrugged back. After a few seconds of staring, however, she turned aside and snickered, getting back to her work while I did mine with a grin. I should probably have lunch with them sometime, but I felt like I wouldn´t be able to look at Shiranui and Tenryuu for a while…. Then, another problem came up in my mind.  
"Bismarck... you know how Musashi reacted when I greeted her, right?" I began, not looking up from my papers.  
"The little U-boot told me, yes. What of it?"  
Looking up, I focused on her brilliant blue eyes that looked back at me.  
"Any suggestions how to solve that? She doesn´t seem very fond of me and I just… I can`t even bring up words when i`m around her. It's like her mere presence cuts off my throat."  
"You are intimidated by your own subordinate, I see. That is unfortunate." Bismarck responded, pondering briefly. "However you look at it, the problem lies with you. You, as her Kommandant, should be able to give her orders despite her intimidation. This, I believe, is what caused her to have this reaction- she desires a strong leader."  
"A strong leader, huh…." I muttered, looking down a bit. "I wonder if i`m the right guy for her then, if I can`t even speak up around her."  
Bismarck came over and grabbed my shoulders, leaving me to look stunned into her eyes. "You –are- a great leader, Herr Admiral. I do not have a shred of doubt about it. I am alive and well thanks to your coordinated and selfless rescue operation… what you lack is self-confidence. You ARE a grand leader already, you simply need to embrace it!"  
"You make it sound so easy, Bismarck… and… you`re quite.. close." I cleared my throat, nudging her shoulder to remind her that I could feel her breath whenever she talked. …smelled minty, oddly enough. Was that chewing gum?  
"…O-oh. I apologize. "  
"No, no, its alright Bismarck. I`ll think it over and then try to talk to her." She nodded to me, and retreated back to some distance despite me saying it was alright. …hm, her chest didn´t bounce one bit.. perhaps that chest harness acted as a bra as well.

I was turning into a pervert, I noticed that. 

* * *

**A/N:** _As you may have noticed, i failed in both delivering this chapter last week as well as meeting my goal of 9000 words. I hope you still enjoy this chapter._


	7. Meeting the Monster

I tried my best to get to some sort of an agreement with Musashi. I really gave it my all. Seven times i tried to talk to her. Tried small talk, attempted to talk about her feelings, or flat out asked what her problem was. She either ignored me, walked off with a glare, or told me it was none of my business. By day four, i had given up trying to confront her... and instead tried to learn more about the problem.

I googled Musashi, read the Wikipedia page four times. Digged up every info and every trivia page i could, and read the official reports of her service history- whatever wasn´t destroyed. Then i began with the TV documentations... CG-crap with a bored narrator, rattling down what i had already heard about... then, finally, i found myself watching a marathon of movies in one of the hobby rooms down in the main section, which just happened to have a comfortable couch and some nicely sized TV... at four in the midnight, it finally happened- i spoke the first word with Musashi again ever since her introduction.  
„What on -earth- are you doing, watching this in the middle of the night..?" Seems as if this got her attention, because she was standing there, staring in disbelief with her arms crossed in front of her massive chest.  
„Watching history. Or what people make us believe is history." I answered, taking a sip out of my coffee cup. „I realized i had little to no idea who you are, Musashi. I just heard 'Yamato class battleship' and freaked out. ...lately, i`ve been wondering, and did some research."  
„...And? Did that satisfy your curiosity?" She glared again, piercing me with her look. I had to shield myself from that and keep talking, else we would be back to square one.  
„There´s about a million movies about Battleship Yamato, and a few dozen about Carrier Shinano... but Battleship Musashi is limited to some text, a few rare photos, and hearsay from eyewitnesses. ...why did they never make a movie about you? Why is there so little information, and pictures about you? Why do people make thousands of models and fanpages, even a 1/10 scale replica of Yamato, but no such thing about you?"  
Musashi closed her eyes and sighed quietly, shaking her head.  
„Its pointless to think about that. Yamato was the first, the pride of the fleet, the flagship of the entire country. There´s a reason she was called Yamato, afterall. I, myself, always stood in her shadow."  
„But you did so much more, and your final battle was just as dramatic and lengthly... you were the bigger and stronger ship, and you accomplished the same things she did..!" Was it working? I couldn´t tell, but we were talking, and that was a first.  
„It doesn´t matter anymore. It's gone and passed by. Who would care that i, Musashi, fought in the Leythe Gulf to bring victory to the fleet, and ensure the survival of my comrades, when Yamato´s story is much more marketable?"  
„Me. Because you´re standing right in front of me. You´re right here, you´re that very ship that did her best out there, and that history just... forgot about. Not just me, everyone should care what you´ve accomplished- and suffered through. More bombs, more torpedos and shell hits than any other ship has ever sustained, and you kept on fighting...! Why won´t anyone remember this, but they do remember a ship that never left the port until the end...? Bismarck sunk on her first mission, after just one ship it sunk, and she fought just as hard as you do... Everyone knows the name Bismarck." Biting my lip, i took another sip of coffee, and looked back to the monitor, where the battleship Yamato was about to be attacked by american aircraft. I almost didn´t notice it, but someone sat down next to me... someone with a lot of mass, who`s glasses reflected the screen.  
And for the faintest moment, i could see a tear running down her cheek.  
We didn´t speak for the entire time, but i could feel that the pictures on the screen made her re-live that day in the Leythe Gulf once more.

The next morning, I was woken up by someone nudging my side, and upon opening my eyes I noticed it was Musashi, still there- from the looks of it, she just woke up too. The TV had turned itself off, but the DVD player was still on, going through its third run of the disc by now, silently.  
"Admiral. Its morning, you should get to work." She reminded me sternly. Still, I couldn´t help but feel glad she at least talked to me by now. Nodding, I adjusted my cap and stretched my back, before getting up with a bit of a groan.  
"You`re right, its probably time for the fleet operations… I need a coffee, though. Do you want one too?" I looked back to her, before she glared to me with a huff, getting up swiftly.  
"I respect you now. I will follow your orders, within reason. That does not require such a familiar tone, Admiral!" Leaving me behind, she went over to the door and forcefully pushed it open, taking a step outside- only to receive a bucket onto her head which dumped warm chocolate all over her body.  
"Wh-whaaaa…?!" She brought out, and I didn`t find the breath, but the same was on my mind. Sobered up and awake now, I hurried over and pulled the bucket off of her. "A-are you okay?! Where did that…?" My question was answered, when Shiranui stood there and lifted a hand.  
"Apologies, Miss Musashi. Shiranui`s special chocolate bath was intended for the Admiral." Oh, you little… She was going to get yelled at later. For now, I took Musashi`s hand and tugged her along, despite her protests, she was unable to see through chocolate smeared glasses and eyes… reluctantly, she followed along and I brought her to the nearest bathroom to wash off. I`m pretty sure she left a visible trail of chocolate behind, too.  
"That accursed destroyer… making a mockery of me! She`ll feel Musashi`s wra…aaaaah, its going down my b-baaaack!" She squeaked out, her head tilting back as if trying to prevent it, but she only made it worse.  
"Oh, don`t worry, she`ll be cleaning this place with a toothbrush by the end of the day…" I grumbled, opening up the door to the bathroom and guiding her over to the sink and turning on the water. "Here, clean your face off, and take a shower. I`ll excuse you for the fleet operations." Silently, she nodded, and began to rinse the candy off of her face, muttering something quietly, before speaking up a bit louder.  
"….It's still not as bad as the base I came from."  
While I secretly snacked off of her shoulder, I turned to her with a blink. "Hm? I can`t imagine Moran´s base being any worse than this… "  
She nodded. "In a base full of destroyers, being the only battleship means you`re the odd one out. They do not like… different ships. Destroyers are envious of almost everyone… but when it comes to battleships, their envy becomes jealousy and sometimes hatred. That Shiranui… I do not believe her when she says she intended it for you. The prank… fits too well for me."  
"….you think its because of your skin, right? Hn… and she already did prank me yesterday.." I responded, picking up more and more chocolate from her shoulder.  
"It's only natural. Look at your ships, then at Musashi… i´m not fitting in."  
"You`re special, I give you that." She twitched, I noticed that, and her skin briefly touched my finger.  
Turning, her crimson red eyes glared back at me, without the protective shield of her glasses. "Special, for the wrong reasons. Being special and being an outcast- that's two different things."  
Looking into her crimson-colored eyes, I could tell she meant that- being an outcast. But I could tell she was overlooking something, as well-  
"Musashi. You´re not the only battleship in this base. Mary and Bismarck are there, too… they´re even foreigners. I don`t know how much truth there is to this whole Destroyer thing, but you`re not alone here… more than that, you outnumber the destroyers four to one."  
She stared against the mirror for a few moments, then raised an eyebrow and looked over to me, a bit out of focus due to her removed glasses. Cute.  
"Four? Pardon me, but i`ve counted three, including myself."  
A light smirk crossed my face.  
"No, Musashi, four. I`m on your side as well."  
She glanced at me briefly, before her eyes turned a bit softer. …then she glared again.  
"Could you stop… eating me? Alas, I have to wash myself. Unless you wish to inspect that too, Admiral…"  
….i have to be honest, I would`ve said yes if she wouldn´t have looked at me like that… so, I nodded and left the room, still tasting some chocolate in my mouth…  
…so, she was nice under all that armor, but she kept bunkering up. I made a wish back then, a wish that I would manage to heal her heart, and see her smile at least once.

Back up in the office, after my fourth coffee, Bismarck gave me a nod and handed me a letter, signed by the naval headquarters, before proceeding on with her work in another room. Mary saluted me briefly with a smile, and I responded in kind, before sitting down to open it.  
My reaction to reading the letter must`ve put her off guard. It wasn`t often I choked on my own breath, seeing a piece of paper before me.  
"Whats wrong, Admiral?! Should I open a window?" She asked, but I shook my head, and put the letter aside again, tossing the envelope into the trash.  
"No need for that, Mary… Its just a family matter."  
"A family matter? What do you mean…?"  
I looked back at her- of course, she wouldn`t understand. Ships only had sisters, afterall, no real family.  
"My mother and father took shelter during an Abyssal attack in Malibu, where they spent their vacation. The shelter was hit by 36 incendiary shells. No survivors." I pressed out, holding back my desire to gag and throw up all over my desk. Under it, my fists clenched into steel, as I was trying to bend the support beams of its frame in anger and frustration. "You probably don`t know what a family is.."  
Mary held up her hand in protest. "A mother is someone who gave birth to you, the father is someone who created you. That much is whats written in the dictionary. So, they were both killed by the Abyss?"  
I gave her a nod, trying to remain calm through all of it. "Yeah. Now me and my sister are the only ones left of my family- my grandparents are already dead, and my brother died when the Abyss first hit. …Now those bastards took all of them, but me and her."  
Mary tilted her head, before shrugging. "Admiral… what do you think, for what kind of reason do they attack us?"  
"Who knows." I answered truthfully, but bit my lip as I was a hair away from yelling at her. "Nobody knows for sure. They just appeared and shot at us, no questions asked."  
She shook her head, looking at me quite intentfully. "That's not what I meant. I asked what –you- think their reason is, not what other people think. You must have made up some sort of story for yourself, right?"  
A fairy began to look at me, before others gathered on my desk as well. Seems like they were interested, too… if I didn´t know any better, I would`ve guessed Bismarck listened in, too.  
"Well… the shipgirl technology is based on them, right? They came from beneath the sea, and some of them carry regular ship equipment, repaired a bit… crudely. So… if there`s a different method for turning a regular ship into a shipgirl, then maybe… they`re the shipwrecks of the past."  
Mary tilted her head, but I continued on.  
"In the war, before and after ships were treated pretty badly. Bombed, set on fire, blown to pieces in nuclear tests, scuttled for weapon tests… sometimes we fire at our own ships to see how those new weapons fair, sometimes to see how we can sink enemies more effectively… if they don`t know that, or if they know and don`t like it… what would you do to someone who killed you? Pay him back in the same way, is what I would do."  
Mary nodded slowly, placing her hand on my shoulder. Seems like she was beginning to understand, but..  
"Something doesn`t fit in, though. There are only so many shipwrecks, but the Abyss keeps coming and coming. Either there´s new abyssals being built underwater, or they restore themselves to full strength even after sinking… whichever one is true… we`re not going to win this war with just violence alone."  
"Why? We ´re doing fine so far." Mary gave off, but that's just the point. I looked back into her brilliant green eyes, and shook my head slowly.  
"We`re barely holding our own at this point. And if this keeps up… Forever, always sinking the same ships that keep coming back- sooner or later we will definitely lose. There`s no telling when, but you can`t defeat an enemy that keeps standing back up when you knock him down. Besides.. in the history of war, only a handful of wars were ended with violence. Exterminating your enemy takes a lot more effort than simply beating him down and making up with him. If they would only ever talk to us, we could find a way together, but… they just aren`t interested in talking."  
"Is that so…" Mary muttered, sighing a tiny bit, but I had already noticed something I wasn`t aware of before.  
"Mary… your hand is very cold." I looked back to her, and slowly started to smile. "…Did you come here to talk, or to kill us?"  
From the sound of things, Bismarck was quite shocked in the other room, and she quickly came over to stare as she was about to say something, but I held her back for now by raising a hand.  
"Mary… our munitions have been sabotaged, the fifteen and eighteen inch shells, respectively. …the sixteen inchers you use, however… they were untouched. You often go out alone, but you don´t go very far, as if you only want to meet someone out of our reach… your eyes and statue fit that of an Abyssal, and Akashi told me your chassis isn`t standard, even for US ships. And finally… the US command has not sent out any ships to our base, they responded minutes after I sent them your papers for confirmation. …I`ll ask again, Mary, what do you want? Do you want to talk?"  
Against my hopes, she slowly shook her head as she gave up, and smiled bitterly.  
"My purpose is to sabotage you, and hinder you from becoming a nuisance in Midway Princess`s plan. Admiral Nimitz isn`t aware of this, either." This let a cold shower run down my back, and I stood up, slapping down on my desk as I looked at her.  
"Then why did you even ask me about my opinion, if you`re just here to kill us?! I`m right here, go ahead!"  
"Admiral!" Bismarck protested, and reached for a handgun I didn`t know she had… a Mauser 08, commonly called Luger. She pointed it at Mary, who did nothing in return.  
"I asked because I don`t know this myself. Why am I here? Why are we fighting this war? What is the purpose the Abyss is trying to archive…? It all seems random and pointless. You humans can`t win, but we`re not trying hard enough to win… we`re just sending out the same ship types over and over with minor improvements, trying to face an ever-changing response from you. If neither side can win, whats the point in fighting a war?"  
I nodded in response, and gave Bismarck a signal to lower her weapon, which she did only with reluctance. Looking back to Mary, I gave her a nod. "That's pretty much the way I see it, too. Still… nobody else ever talked to us. Without that, peace can`t be made.."  
"Peace?" Mary blinked. "I don´t think I ever heard Midway or the others use that word… no, the Abyss isn´t interested in that. They would have mentioned it, if they would."  
"Damn. …Well, that brings us back to square one.. but at least it feels good to hear the opinion of someone else for once."  
Maryland, or whatever her real name was, looked at me in a manner that awaited a response, and I gave her a surprised blink instead.  
"What is it?" Was my question for her, and the answer came in form of another question.  
"Aren`t you going to get rid of me now? Destroy me, or scrap me?"  
The thought never crossed my mind, but… yes, I should do that. Not just because she was an abyssal but also because those people destroyed my family. But somehow… somehow It didn`t, perhaps because Mary was right there in front of me, talking like this… and because of the things we could learn from her, of course.  
"No, why should i? No one got hurt from your sabotage attempts so far… and one side has to start with the diplomacy. As you said- they aren´t interested, so we will have to begin with that. If you want, then you could be an official member of our fleet."  
Bismarcks glance of disapproval aside, Mary seemed tempted for a second, but then she shook her head.  
"No, I can`t do that. Midway has me in her grasp. If she calls I will have to follow. I cannot join your fleet if I am a member of Midways fleet…"  
"But you could stay here." I cut in, interrupting her with a determined glance. "Stay here until she deems your operation to be over… we could fake some sabotage attempts to please her, and you could stay. Or maybe you ask for permission and its an official cultural exchange…?"  
Suddenly, Mary started to laugh out loud.  
"Aahahaha! Permission for a cultural exchange?! Admiral, you`re something…! Midway Princess doesn`t care about that, she doesn`t even care about the war in itself- all she wants is her 'Kingdom' that she keeps talking about… Midway Station!"  
That… didn´t sound good. Midway was still the most important outpost from here to America, and that Princess seemed pretty damn desperate to get it. He didn´t have to be a genius to figure out that their current owners would not be okay with this change of events. Still, what she said next surprised me.  
"If I may- I would like to continue on as we were. I`m Maryland, under your command, and you give me orders. From what i`ve seen of you so far, you`re an admirable man, and a great leader." The Abyssal in disguise bowed lightly.  
"Ja sure, praise him more…" Bismarck muttered, rolling her eyes.  
I gave her a nod in return, smiled, and put a hand under her chin to raise it. "No need to bow down before me. Let's continue to do our best, together. …Bismarck, please keep this to yourself. I`m not sure how the others would react to an Abyssal in our ranks. We`ll tell them another time."

Reluctantly, the german nodded with a salute, and stood straight until I dismissed them both. One leaving with a smile, the other with a frown… and as I was alone again, the stinging feeling of loss returned to me in full, undiluted strength. I was… alone now. A sister was out there, but we never met. As far as I knew, I had no one else.

My sister, huh. I had known of her for a while, heard she was stationed at Henderson Airbase, something to do with the whole planegirl project, but until now, I never considered to visit her.  
Now, though…  
"Bismarck- I won`t be in the office tomorrow, I need to be elsewhere on a private matter. Could you handle things for me here in the meantime?

The next day, I assembled the fleet in the lobby after packing the most important of my belongings into a suitcase, getting ready to meet my sister at last- but first, I gave them some final instructions.  
"Tenryuu, Musashi- head out to the Eastern Solomon Islands, intelligence reports there`s an Abyssal repair facility of sorts.. i`d like you to investigate and destroy it if possible, but don`t take any risks- if the resistance is too great, leave it be for now and report back, they`ll send a bigger fleet." I explained to the two warships, while Tenryuu grinned and nodded to me, Musashi gave off a grumble.  
"This Musashi, you underestimate her greatly. I can deal with a lot of threats at once- I am a Yamato-class, afterall."  
"Hey, if you think you can take them on, go ahead. But if there`s more than two dozen ships, leave it to a bigger fleet… you`d get swarmed, or attract even bigger fish." A smile crossed my face, feeling warm after we finally broke the ice and talked… even if it was in this tone. "Trust me, Musashi. I know what i`m doing. As for the rest of you- Bismarck will be my substitute for now, Mary can assist her- Maruyu and Nui-chan go on a cruise through the resource stations."  
"H-hey, wait a minute. Why do I have to babysit the submarine?!" Shiranui suddenly spoke up, uncharacteristically loud and clear, and seemed a bit distressed. "I`m sorry about the chocolate, okay?"  
"If you`re sorry, then make it up by carrying some extra drums." I responded to her with a sly smirk, and I could swear Musashi and Tenryuu grinned just briefly. "Anyway, Unryuu- you´re still on kitchen duty, but I put in a request to build some planes for you. So, hang in there, it won´t be much longer until you can shine." The response was a smile that made my heart melt, and I swallowed dry, before saluting them all. "I will be back in the evening, until then- call me if there´s anything up."

Soon after, I found myself in a vertical-takeoff passenger jet – the only way to travel with relative safety as long as the Abyssals pointed AA guns into the skies. Starting vertical, getting very high up and then flying off with Mach-speed was the way to travel these days. It had its upsides and downsides, of course, and accidents happened frequently, so I was still a bit nervous. Not as nervous as I was about meeting my older sister, though. As far as I know, she was about a year or so older than me, she was given away when my family couldn`t support her… or so I was told. Seems like she was born straight into the military- the one they gave her to was an institution of the JDSF.

It wasn´t until i actually arrived at the Henderson airbase that i found out what a difference was gaping between ship- and planegirls. The layout of the base, for instance, was completely different- it more or less resembled army barracks, with a hangar opposing the main building and a large, open area stretching out beyond. In the distance, i could see a large, obviously man-made lake, mock-up tanks, fresh craters. It looked like thats where they would be training during drills... it didn´t exactly remind me of the friendly, ex-school building i was used to, but a cold and strict military base... just as i was about to approach closer, a voice came up just outside of my field of vision.

"Its not much. It would be far bigger and better staffed if we had a larger budget. But that won´t happen until we score some significant impact on the war, and reduce the costs in general. For now, we will have to make due with this. I assume you`re used to something better."  
Turning to the side, a woman was glancing at me- her slender body was supported by a modern-looking cane she was propping up on, her uniform- a grey pencil skirt with matching grey blazer, golden accents and insignia over a white blouse with a moss-green tie- instantly told me this was no planegirl. The uniform was too expensive, too well-kept... she had been out of combat for a while. Despite this, i couldn´t help but notice she carried a firearm on her hip, in a strapless holster- it looked like a pistol at first, but then i noticed the barrel, the frame and the overall thickness of it was far too big- it seemed like a severely shortened semi-automatic shotgun, with a pistol grip. Huh. Maybe i should get something like that, seemed like it might hold back an Abyssal at point-blank range.  
It was then that i looked up into her face- a stern, analyzing glance behind thin-rimmed, square glasses, amber eyes trying to figure out my whereabouts- if i was worthy of her time. The face looked a lot like my own, except smoother, without the stubble i sometimes left on, a strict, slicked back hairdo with only a few black bangs coming up front. Her gloved hand tapped the cane on the ground, as if expecting an answer.

"My own base isn´t that good either, its a repurposed school, barely big enough to support 20 people at best, but it works... for now." I answered, looking into her eyes once more, before swallowing lightly and attempting to break the ice that was building up. "You´re... my sister? You´ve got Mom`s cheeks."  
"And your face was... graced with father´s chin." She retorted, giving a light nod, before extending the hand that wasn´t holding onto anything. "Akiha Yamamoto. Marshal of the planegirl airforce, Commander of the 4th planegirl wing. This is our home base at this moment... officially called Henderson Base, although Henderson Airport was closed down years ago."  
I gave back a smile, although i received none, i still felt somewhat accepted by her- this was far better than my bumpy start with Musashi. A gesture of hers later, we began to pace around the base as she gave me a tour.

"In total, we currently have fifteen planegirls stationed here. The entire fourth wing consists of twelve, plus three from the fifth wing that are currently here on an exchange program to improve on the performance and combat effectiveness of the girls. In the event of an attack, we`re able to deploy in less than thirty minutes, and arrive at the target in four point two minutes if its less than 1000 kilometers away. This far, we have only had two missions- both involved escorting shipgirls."  
"Makes sense." I replied to her, my hands folded behind my back. "The enemy is seaborne, so an attack on land isn´t going to happen. Navy and Airforce do make a good combination, too."  
"In theory." Akiha responded, glancing ahead. "In reality, planegirls and shipgirls... have their differences. Try as you might, they don´t get along. Racisim, so to speak. ...the planegirls are envious of their armor and firepower, the ships of their speed and mobility, and either one is making the other look bad."  
I rolled my eyes at this revelation. It sounded too stupid to be a lie, though... shipgirls could really be like this. "Thats childish."  
"It is, and we have anything but time for something like this. The airforce is expecting results- if none follow, they´ll shelf the project away at some point, and the planegirls will become scrap- or at best,, they´re remade into ships." From the tone of her voice, i could tell that we thought alike there. That was geniune concern, hidden under the slate of duty. "Either way would put me out of a job, and i don´t think any of them will like it."

While we approached the barracks, i gave her a look from the side. "Its not often i hear a commander voice concern about what their girls like or don´t like. Most still seem to think of them as mindless weapons."  
"Because they´re senile fools, of course. Times have changed. War, its very essence, has changed- we`re no longer fighting giant hulks of metal, but small, man-sized targets that are even more intelligent than we are." Akiha`s reasoning and intelligence surprised me more and more. "The war they are used to is gone, and will likely never return again. Tactics, strategies, paradigms, doctrines they all need to be rewritten for this new era of war... this is no longer men against men, army against army. Soldiers might be involved, yes, but their role has moved into the background. The shipgirls, and planegirls dominate the battlefield- and if we don´t treat them well, with respect and the necessary care, they might one day turn their weapons against us."  
...Wow, that... hit me in the guts.  
"Then what. Do you think you can switch them off before that happens? Pull a lever and make them all behave? Throw some tear-gas and beat them into submission? No. When that happens, it happens and there´s no stopping it." She finished up, leaving me speechless for a few seconds, before i came up with an obvious response.  
"Then we´re finished."  
"...I`m glad to see we`re on the same page, brother. Lets pray that day never comes."

Upon entering the barracks together with Akiha, we were greeted with a sight i didn´t exactly see the first time. Five girls sat around in what passed as a livingroom, as sparse and spartanic as the decoration was, the TV seemed okay, as the five were watching it closely- some reports of the war, earlier ones i`d already seen. But they were so much into it, i decided not to spoil it to them what happened- its almost like as if they were watching a movie of sorts. After a minute or so, Akiha loudly cleared her throat in annoyance, trying to get their attention... as soon as she did this, they practically jumped up from their seats- a lanky, average-sized blonde with long open hair in a green jumpsuit, a short dark brown-haired girl which reached to my waist, at best, and yet didn´t seem childish- more like a dwarf of some sort. The third was a tall, glaring persona, a bit more curved than the other two with a long, neatly tied black mane that ended at her thighs, mustering me with her critical eyes. The fourth looked more lazy than anything else, her hair untidy and wild as she gave us a lackluster salute- what intrigued me most about her hair was the colors, as it seemed to be dirt blonde in base color, but with white and black stripes in it. She too wore the same jumpsuit as the first one, while the other two had a dark grey one on. Finally, the fifth was another dirt blonde one, standing tall and grinning at me with a challenging, almost fear-inducing expression, her hair was kept in a short, sideways ponytail, and she wore the green jumpsuit. Akiha took a few moments, glancing at them for their misbehavior, before introducing them to me in order.  
"These are our aces- YF-22 Lightning, air dominance fighter. A-10 Thunderbolt, a heavily armed attack bomber. F-4 Phantom, an attack bomber capable of dogfighting, same as IDS Tornado, although Tornado is more specialized in dogfights than bombing. Finally, F-14 Tomcat, the defender of the fleet- a short ranged, well armed dogfighter with plenty of potential- if she would ever use it well, that is."

"Pleased to meet you all." I gave them back, giving them a salute with a grin, which eased up the mood a little bit- Phantom kept staring at me, though, and i could swear she gave it a dismissive sigh.  
"Girls, this is Lieutenant Commander Shichiro Yamamoto, in charge of the Okinawa naval base. He`s our guest for today- behave well around him... DONT get into arguments about navy versus airforce, i`m warning you. If you get into a fight with him, you´re grounded for two weeks." This threat of Akiha had them swallow and shiver in unison, as if being grounded meant the biggest punishment imaginable... maybe it was, they were airplanes afterall. Not being able to fly was... probably quite scary. "The same goes to you, Shichiro. Should you start a fight with my girls, you`re gonna get yourself court martialed, is that clear?!"  
That was my turn to snap back and salute. "Y-yes ma`m. I`m not here for that, anyway. I was just here to see how you do and- "  
She cut me off with a light sock in the guts. "Thats enough, right there. We`ve prepared a few things for you. In an hour and a half, there`s going to be a training drill- just for you to see, so you can tell all your navy friends how amazing the planegirl force is...! And you girls, you give your very best today to make sure he doesn´t have to lie! Got it?!"

"YES MA`M!" It came in unison from the five, before they lowered their salutes at last as Akiha gave them a sign to be dismissed. "There. I`ll need ot take care of some paperwork first- required for each training drill. Go ahead and... try to be civil." Akiha mentioned to me, before heading off, giving me a pat on the shoulder as her cane clicked on the ground with each step, same as her heavy boots.  
Well, here i was, left alone with those five girls... i might as well do as she told me, because there sure wasn´t going to be anything else going on in the next hour and a half. Phantom, however, already turned her back and went to the TV, as Thunderbolt blinked a few times, not sure what to do next, until she joined in.

"...Man, she is harsh." I muttered to myself, looking back to where Akiha had disappeared to. While i meant to keep it to myself, it seemed like the remaining three had heard it.  
"She is, i guess. Are people less harsh in the navy then?" Already, someone broke the taboo of navy vs airforce... it seemed like it was Lighting, and Tomcat as well as Tornado seemed taken aback by this.  
"Not specifically. Some of them can be pretty harsh, but especially some younger commanders are a bit more lax. Akiha´s right- war is changing in its very core, and given that the weapons we wield aren´t mindless machines, we should start treating them with some more respect." I answered, catching myself as i idly put my hands into the uniform pockets. "I´m trying my best to give my fleet the biggest freedom possible, while keeping them together as an effective unit at the same time."  
"Freedom´s good. Freedom and democracy, yeah." Tomcat joined in, nodding a bit, receiving a glance from Tornado. "But too much freedom can be dangerous, you know!" The fighter-bomber said, hitting her on the head- the hit was returned, and they were soon grumbling at each other.

"Eh... well, if it prevents scenes like this..." Lightning muttered, looking at the two briefly, then back to me. "...Well, since you just arrived, how about i give you a tour, or something, to pass the time."  
Again, the two stopped, and blinked in surprise. Seems like something was going on...?  
"Well, sure. Akiha just gave me a brief overview of the base, while heading straight here... and i`m not exactly that informed about you planegirls, so..."  
"Oh, oh then i´ll tell you a thing or two as well! Lets.. lets go." She told me, before heading off on her own, straight back to where i had come from- the front entrance.  
In the brief moment i remained there, i could hear the two planes mutter quietly. "...Since when is Lightning talking to strangers..? ...And this much, too... she barely talks at all normally.."  
Dismissing that, i ignored it for now and headed off to catch up to Lightning, who seemed pretty determined in getting out of there.  
As soon as i caught up to her, she started to go more slowly, realizing she left me behind as she darted out of the room.  
„Well,... i´m.. not so good at this, but.. if you have any questions, just ask, i`ll answer if i can."  
I smiled a little. „No need to be so stiff,... YF-22 Lightning, right..?"  
„Just Lightning, please- our full model designations just... don´t sound a lot like names."  
Understandable, i guess. Shipgirls didn´t have alphanumeric numbers either, which made them seem a little bit more human. Maybe that s what she was aiming for...  
„So...uh, if you call me that, can i call you Shichiro too?" Huh, i wasn´t used to that. The shipgirls insisted on calling me Admiral, but... I gave her a light grin. „Sure, i guess that's fine. So.. i`m no expert in the whole airforce lingo. Whats that with air dominance, and dogfighting, and attack bombing all about..?"  
Lightning beamed a smile to me, and started to explain as if she was talking about what she wanted for christmas. Seems like i hit a good spot there. „Ahh, well, dogfighting refers to two airplanes engaging each other with their own weapons- the whole dodging and attacking looks a bit like dogs going at each other on the radar, so that's where the name probably comes from. That requires a looot of skill, but it can be pretty fun if you know what you´re doing. Air dominance, that's my territory- it pretty much means shooting down every enemy plane in the area until we´re the dominant force up there.. only the most agile and maneuverable planes can do stuff like that. Finally, attack bombers are basically bombers who are still fast enough to engage other planes.. though they`ll pretty much defenseless against full-on fighters with good pilots. ...ah, that's a bit confusing, since we´re both pilot and plane." She chuckled at that, and i shot a grin back. Well, i got about half of that, but it wan`t really necessary to understand it all- i was in the navy after all, this wasn´t my forte.  
The hangar looked just like that of a sports plane from the outside, but the inside resembled Akashi´s workshop, if anything. Several man-sized airplanes were put up on racks, one half-disassembled one was standing around in a corner, probably for stripping replacement parts from it. There were at least five different models, but Lightning proudly strutted over to one with a sleek aerodynamic profile, but a lot of sharp corners- with two distinctly angled tailplanes, angled air intakes, and quite large engines. ..one thing i noticed was that there was no window on them, but a hinge to pull them open. She was about to demonstrate why.  
„This one´s my rig, right there! Its pretty much like a suit- it opens up, and we lie down inside it- the arms go into the wings, the legs into the fuselage, and instead of a window to look out of, we´ve got a monitor down there, corresponding with a set of cameras on the front, and two on the back. The suits draw the fuel directly from our bodies- and while we can manipulate pretty much anything just by thought, since we´re connected, we can move our arms and legs too, to get some better maneuvering done... and there´s a little space for missiles and bombs, right there where my belly goes. Yeah, go ahead and say it, that suit makes me look fat."  
I gave back a chuckle. „Thats not nice to say to a lady. Besides, you look half my weight, that's hardly correct."  
Lightning grinned a bit. „Yeah, you might be right with that...! We planegirls don´t have all that thick armor the shipgirls have, so we´re a whole lot lighter... instead, we´ve got a lot more fuel in our bodies, and we don`t use as much in our daily lives.I can run for about an hour and a half until i have to bail out from a lack of fuel." She gave the „suit" a pat on flat side. „Bailing out is pretty spectacular, too. The whole top half blows off, with some small explosives, and we´re torn out by the drag of the wind- then we engage a parachute and leave the plane up to its own mercy, without engine power."  
…? That didn´t sound too good. „Lightning... you make it sound as if that happens a lot."  
She nodded. Oh. No comment about that, but she didn´t loose her smile... still, i could feel some- heaviness, coming from that. As if she didn´t want to talk about it.  
„Ah, well, so long as that system works, its fine i guess... but, there´s no undercarriage, is there..?" At least i didn´t see any, and nothing it would fold into. She brightened up a bit, nodded to me.  
„Yeah, we don´t have that sort of thing. There´s a lot of fancy tricks for landing- you can land vertical, like standing up, or gently skit across a patch of grass.. the later´s not recommended. But usually we either get caught by a net like a drone, or we land on the water- the suit has sort of a self-inflating raft left and right of the bomb bay, which triggers when we get below fifty meters over water. So we`re kind of floatplanes that way. ...you guys in the navy have a lot of floatplanes, don´t you?"  
I had to laugh at her enthusiasm, and nodded. „Sure, but none of them are your size. They´re all the size of my palm, you know. Still, you guys sound way more effective than they are- with them, you can be lucky if they manage to take out a single Abyssal."  
Lightning grinned to me, balling her fist in a challenging manner. „I could take out five, six, or seven at once, Shichiro- don´t underestimate me!"  
„I wasn´t going to!" A few little laughs like this later, and after we had taken a seat, everything was forgotten about the tour she was supposed to give me- instead we were just hanging around in the hangar, talking about the differences of shipgirl planes and planegirls... and real aircraft.  
Finally, i tried to ask something i had been wondering about.  
„Lightning... is Akiha always like this?"  
„What do you mean?" The blonde gave back, tilting her head slightly.  
„This. I came here to see her because our parents died yesterday, and she makes it seem like its any other day of the week. She left me standing there, saying she had paperwork to do, but we would have so much to talk about.. we never met, afterall, but we think a lot alike." I was genuinely worried about that woman, something didn´t feel right. That cane, too.. she was way too young to be walking by a cane.  
„I´m not sure... she´s always been like this. Duty this, duty that, importance of duty, destroying the enemy, et cetera... she has no hobbies or something like that, in case you´re asking, its like her sole purpose for life is this base, and us." Lightnings comment there made things a whole lot clearer.  
„I get it." I simply said, biting my lip, looking down. „I get it now. Me, mom and dad.. they aren´t her family. She was given away early in her life and didn`t have much to do with them, she never met me- you guys are her family. Those people that died yesterday are just another casulty to her."  
The planegirls face paled, and she covered her mouth in a shocking realization. „She... she cares for us... like this..?"  
„Thats the only conclusion i can come to when i think about this. It all fits in... and her strict behavior is explained by what she told me earlier- the airforce wants results, else this base and the whole project will be scrapped. So she´s desperately trying to make you guys stand out and fight better than the rest."  
Lightning swallowed hard, and seemed like she was close to tears at this. Still, there`s one more thing i had to ask. „Hey... hey, Lightning. Stay with me, just for a moment longer. That cane.. what happened to her? She´s definitely not using it because of aging bones."  
The planegirl composed herself, wiping her eyes and nodding lightly. „It was an accident in one of the few live battles we had... we were protecting a group of shipgirls who were escorting a corvette of Admirals and her.. suddenly, an Abyssal came out of the water and latched onto her leg, trying to bite her in two. The nearest shipgirl reacted and fired at it, but... the bullet went through the target and into her hip. She survived, but ever since she can`t walk very well... and has been wearing that huge gun in case it happens again."  
„God damn it. That explains even more about her reactions earlier... she didn´t seem the least bit happy to see me." Looking down, i started to realize just how bad of an idea this whole thing was. But before i went into full-on melancholia, Lightning spoke up once more.  
„I envy your shipgirls for having a commander like you... someone they can talk to like this. Miss Yamamoto never does this... she says she doesn´t have time for idle talk. Sometimes i think she´s just shy, but... that can´t be right. What i wanted to s-say is... you´re a very nice guy. ...I might be lonely when you leave again."  
….I didn´t expect that, but for better or worse, a siren rang about over the airfield, reminding us that we spent the last hour and a half talking about each other, and completely forgot about the training drill. 

* * *

**A/N:** _Due to the length of this chapter, its going to be cut into two parts- so stay tuned for part two!_  
_This here`s the introduction of the planegirls- i was thinking about a possible spinoff featuring them prominently. Would be great to hear some opinions on that in the comments._


	8. Warships and Airplanes (safe)

While the girls i had met before- Tomcat, Tornado, Phantom and Thunderbolt, rushed over to the hangar and got into their suits, i took a moment to glance up into the sky- it was clear, not too warm and not too cold- perfect weather. As if it didn`t matter that i was here, they would`ve flown anyway.  
At least i`d like to think that, to calm my nerves and get on a different train of thought, but someone ruined that for me already, as Lightning poked my shoulder with a grin, and pointed over to a slightly larger rig, thicker in build, with longer wingspan.  
"What are you stargazing for, Shichiro? You`re going to watch us- firsthand."  
"W-wait. What? You mean… inside one of those? But i`m not a-" She cut me off with a grin, as Akiha came over with a mask and an overall in her hands, looking a bit smug… as smug as that woman could get with her constantly stern face. The hand holding the cane also had a small box of… something in it, but for now she just pushed the overall and the mask in my hand.  
"Put that on, unless you want to faint up there. The air pressure`s not that high at forty thousand feet, you know." Her voice made it fairly clear that I had no saying in this, and with a sigh, I nodded and resigned to my fate, as they showed me to a dressing room, in which I slid out of my all too comfortable uniform and into a somewhat tight overall in a blue color. I could only guess the color coding was relevant to the rank, or the role the person wearing it had- green for the fighters, black for the bombers, and blue for the… guests.  
"Here, take one of those too. It helps against the sickness the G-forces will do to you." The small box turned out to be pills, and she handed me one… with a grimace, I swallowed it, then put on the mask… which surely made me look like a monster from a sixties horror movie, but Akiha gave it an approving glance and gestured off to the plane rig, which Lightning was opening up at this point.

A noise came from above… I peeked up, and very faintly, I could make out the outline of an Abyssal jet, its green exhausts leaving a corona in the sky. …that wasn`t a target drone, was it? No one was airborne yet.  
…that was not good.  
"Akiha!" I called over, but she didn`t hear me- reluctantly, I went back to Lightning and the others to warn them at least.  
"Whats with the yelling, Shichiro?" She asked, tilting her head in a cute manner, but I had no eyes for that in the moment.  
"A recon plane of the Abyss..! I saw it just now, flying overhead!"  
Tornado rolled her eyes, then crossed her arms while glancing at me.  
"Its probably one of the target drones they started pre-maturely. Don´t get your panties into a bunch, naval guy."  
"Think first, then open your mouth." Phantom responded in a harsh, but cold tone. "Why would they start a single drone before any of us is airborne? We need a minute or two to get stable. The naval guy has a point."  
"We should stay aground, then. Just to be safe." Tomcat suggested, but I didn`t think that was a good idea. They needed victories- they wouldn´t get any by avoiding fights like this.  
"Rather than that, load live ammo into your guns and go up there- that single plane isn`t going to be alone if it spots us down here, you know. Warships or fighter planes- both have the same basic purpose. Protect their home. You`d fail at that task if you would let this place get bombed."  
The five stared at me for a few seconds, Lightning especially, before Thunderbolt grinned wide and slammed her little fist into her palm. "Hell yes! Lets get up there and show them what we`re made of!"  
"I suppose this is what we trained for." Phantom agreed, nodding a single time.  
"It is, yeah. Lets grab some ammo and some missiles… and you, Thunderbolt, you put on some bombs, too, then we`ll blow up whoever sent that plane up." Tomcat gave off, in a rare display of enthusiasm.  
Lightning seemed like she was about to facepalm, but then she was just smiling with a hint of disappointment. "Alright then, i`ll get into my regular rig. Get into shelter with Miss Yamamoto, and-"  
For a split second I considered that, getting into safety and letting her handle it. But that look of disappointment told me she really, really wanted to fly with me… and damn it, it might be fun afterall.  
I grinned at her, and gave the big plane rig a pat. "I already swallowed that awful pill, Lightning. I`ll fly with you no matter what."  
"But… that's a real combat mission now, not just a drill… you might be killed, you know."  
What else was new. I could get killed every day. This job came with danger, and i`ve been looking it in the eye more than once by now. I gave her a nod. "Yeah. But I can try and help to make sure you aren't. Just get in, and tell me what to do."

Meanwhile, a few miles away from our position, Admiral Nimitz and Aircraft Carrier Demon seemed satisfied as their recon flight returned, reporting a clear signal for the first bombing raid.  
With a sign of her hand, Carrier ordered the ships submerged at the shore to raise- four Wo-class carriers, and two brand new Ra-class heavy carriers- Abyssals lying flat down on the water, fitted with rigs the size of the Carrier demon`s own, each one carrying five of the new Shi-class heavy bombers- formerly destroyers, they were refurbished into girls that resembled a mechanical, bizarre rendition of an eagle, carrying large bombs and a pair of miniguns each, a cluster five regular jet engines used by the Abyssal planes, mounted on each leg, gave them the thrust needed to take off. Their "beaks" were made of a hardened material, capable of piercing through a tank during a nosedive, which made them useable for suicide attacks, and while their heavier bodies meant less mobility and speed, the smaller planes from the Wo-classes would protect them in the case of resistance.  
"Recon reports clear weather and no enemy activity. Seems like the perfect conditions for a test run." Carrier said to her superior, who nodded to her with crossed arms.  
"Yes. Proceed as planned- a wave of standard fighters, then the first Shi-class group, followed by another wave of fighters to guard their backs- and repeat that with the other group. First group targets the hangar, the second targets the bigger house." Nimitz commanded, looking ahead to the faint outline of the airbase.  
"Aye-aye. …If only Airfield Princess could see this, she`d be so mad." Carrier responded with a smirk, and gave another hand signal, followed by a mutter of words unable to be understand by humans- the maws of the Wo-class carrier decks then opened, extending a catapult each, before firing off jet fighters, one after another, until a total of five were in the air- then, the Ra-class on the left side brought their attack bombers into the sky, and the Wo`s followed up with more planes of their own. Getting into formation, they headed straight for Henderson…

With the other four girls being locked into catapult-like contraptions, I was the last one left behind- Lightning had taken her place, lying down in the plane rig and holding onto controls and handlebars, before giving a light nod. "Your turn."  
"Mine? .. where`s the second sea- wait, I have to lie down on top of you?"  
She nodded again. "That's the idea."  
"You can`t be serious…" I moaned a bit, but eventually succumbed to my fate, climbing inside and lying down… it was comfortable, all the spaces for my limbs were there, I could reach the handlebars alright- if only I wasn`t tightly pressed against Lightnings back, it would be quite alright. That, and the feeling of claustrophobia that hit me as soon as the lid closed, and bolts clicked into place.  
"Alright, we´re locked in. Switching to auxiliary air supply." She responded, and all of the sudden, I got fresh air blown into my mask in gentle puffs. "Air supply ready. Fuel linkage established… I have control. Turning on display."  
"Woah!" Next, the seemingly standard pressure mask I wore lit up from the inside, and on a thin layered LCD screen, it displayed the inside of the hangar, as an HUD came up in the corners of my sight, and crosshairs, labeled "No weapon selected" appeared in the middle. "Do you see that too?"  
"Don`t have to. I feel it." I could hear her grinning, and it didn`t take a genius to imagine she enjoyed this whole situation. No wonder she wanted to do this so bad, her butt was quite firmly pressed against my crotch, and I imagine under acceleration this would get a whole lot worse. I had no time to think about that, though, as the roof of the hangar was pulled away, the catapult extended, and the entire plane, us included, was pointed almost 90 degrees up to the sky.  
"Is that normal…?" I asked with a bit of hesitation.  
"Yep. In the next ten seconds we`ll be fired off with nearly 200 kilometers an hour. Then the engines kick in, and we soar off into the sky." Lightning explained, not making me feel any better. That sounded quite like a brutal kick-off, and my suspicions turned out to be quite true.  
From one second to another, I felt like someone punched me in the back as the whole rig suddenly catapulted forward, pressing me closer to Lightning than I ever wanted to- Okay, that was a lie, I was starting to enjoy being close to her, but the G-forces practically crushing me was not fun. As I got a bearing of myself, we were already above ground, seventy meters in fact, according to my HUD, and I panicked for a second before my pilot chuckled.  
"Relax, Shichiro. I got things under control." A whining noise passed by, and I could feel a blasting force firing out the exhausts. The engines were on now, and my arms began to move along with the wings of the plane, as we turned over into a horizontal position.  
"….Wow." I brought out, seeing the view from up there, the tiny buildings underneath, the endless blue we were about to dive into.  
"…And that's why I love being a planegirl." Lightning commented softly, doing a few gentle maneuvers to make sure everything worked right. In the distance, our radar picked up the first hostiles, but she seemed to take her time…  
"Lightning. Fifteen… no, thirty hostiles approaching our position, they`re splitting up into groups…"  
"Don`t you worry about it!" Tomcats voice came from the radio, and from underneath us her plane suddenly came up, a few puffs of smoke and some thumping noises later, tracer rounds soared through the sky and cut one of the Abyssal jets into pieces. That's when they spread out, attempting to circle us.  
"Tomcat, you fucking idiot…!" Lightning bursted out, pulling a harsh curve to the left which made my fingers grow numb from the forces. "Now the element of surprise is gone!"  
"Shooting clay traps out of the sky is no fun, Light! We have them outnumbered anyways, by a hundred!"  
"Tch." She grumbled, pulling the plane straight again. "Shichiro, this is going to get rough and hard, I hope you`re prepared. In a fight like this, I can´t stop and turn over just because you`re sick."  
"Don´t worry about it, turn around, we`ve got one on our tail." I commented, not seeing anything, but I could hear an engine approaching.  
"Wai… oh shit, you`re right." What shook me next was a barrel roll, as bullets fizzed through the sky and missed us, scratching the paintjob a few times, before Lightning suddenly pulled a J-turn out of nowhere, attacking one of the jets with a burst from our main gun.

"Admiral..! I`m receiving report… that our fighters are… being attacked!" Carrier gave off, turning her head to Nimitz quickly. "It appears… those planegirls can start… faster than we expected."  
"Let them. We`ve got more than enough to put a stop to this… start the rest of the jets, Wo-class." The Admiral looked over to the leading Wo, which nodded a single time with a determined "Wo." Coming from its mouth, before reaching her arm out ahead- once again its carrier deck opened, and planes poured out of it in droves, this time, not stopping at just five.

"Don´t bother with the little ones, Lightning- they`re just protecting the big ones." By the time I told her this, it became more and more obvious just how little value the regular planes had, as a seemingly endless amount of them came from the coast.  
"Shit…! While you`re here, Shichiro, make yourself useful. There`s a button and a trigger on each of your handlebars- the button engages the target lock-on, the trigger fires a missile. I`ll handle the main gun." She just said that so lightly, as if I had been doing that all my life, and before I knew it the aforementioned trigger swung out from the previously smooth handle.  
"H-how do you expect me to handle this…?! I never fired rockets before!"  
I could hear her snicker.  
"Its simple, just point and fire. The warheads guidance will take care of the rest." She made it sound so easy, but I suppose it was due to the whole seeking missile thing. But that would only work with a lock-on, and while she was racing around at eight hundred kilometers an hour, dodging enemy fire…!  
Then I noticed something, a pattern emerging in their movements. Those bombers were nothing like we`d ever seen before, and judging from their armament they were extremely dangerous, but…  
I took my chance. Without waiting for the lock-on, I pulled the trigger as soon as the aircraft was in the right position, left of the nearest bomber- at that time, a rotating rig, holding twelve small missiles emerged from the belly of the aircraft and launched a single one, which soared straight ahead. As Tomcat engaged it, it flew off to the left, as predicted- and detonated violently, the large bombs they carried racking up the force into a chain reaction.  
"Wha..?! You.. you didn`t even aim! And with the first shot too! What kind of luck do you have, dammit?!" Lightning complained, pulling over harshly to avoid an engaging group of smaller fighters, which were then taken out by Tomcats main gun.  
"I noticed they always fly off to the left when they avoid something. So I fired one to the left just as Tomcat was about to target it." I explained, starting to feel a bit nauseous from the constant movement of my surroundings… she really wasn´t kidding about how rough this was.  
"Ah…! Kinda like with the Zeros, huh? Alright…! Lightning, calling everyone- the big bombers always dodge to the left! Try to make use of that!"  
A plinking noise caught my ear, and I shuddered at the thought of what it was- Lightning didn´t seem disturbed by it, and the plane seemed to work fine, but… without armor plating, I didn`t feel very safe with vehicles that were being shot at.  
"Phantom here. Caught one- Target locked. Firing lance one." Not much of a talker, was she. Still, the resulting explosion was nice to look at… what wasn`t nice was to see one of the bombers drop their payload.  
"Lightning…! They´re dropping bombs on the barracks…!"  
"Keep your shirt on. I`ve seen it."  
My stomatch then went into a direction I didn`t want it to go as we went for a nosedive, our 20mm autocannons making short work of the bombs in midair, before she pulled the plane… or rather, herself, back up, where the bomber was caught in a dive-attack of Tornado. Seven of them were left, and three dozen fighters… My trigger finger twitched off another rocket, but rather than catching the bomber I had aimed for, it hit a fighter head-on and brought five of them that were closeby to the ground.  
"This is one hell of a training drill…!" It came from Thunderbolt, the slowest one- but also the most powerful, as I was about to find out. A short burst from her main gun made the airplane stall in midair as the breeze of bullets cut a line through the enemy aircraft, destroying the enemy bomber they were hiding. They weren´t using their gatling guns at all… perhaps they weren`t meant to be used in dogfighting.  
"…Admiral Yamamoto… Come in, Admiral." It came from my headset, and I nearly fired off a rocket at the surprise of it. That was…  
"Musashi?! Whats going on?"  
The noise of machinery, mainly electric motors and elevators was heard in the background. "Tenryuu and I have made contact with a number of enemy carriers, roughly fourty miles from your current position. Tenryuu says that the human with them is their commander… permission to engage?"  
Human… that woman from before, she meant. Gritting my teeth, I nodded slowly.  
"Granted. Focus fire on the carriers, though. We need to stop them at the source. ..Lightning, pull over."  
"What?!" It bursted from her, baffled. "We can´t leave the fight now!"  
"We won`t. Forty miles from here, the carriers are defenselessly waiting for their planes to return… the planegirl airforce needs some good results, so lets blow them up while we can!"  
That was a bold plan, afterall, that woman could have things in store I was not even remotely aware of, we were in a slow, two seater training jet, and we were up against a multitude of abyssal ships… but to hell with it, I wasn´t going to let this go.  
Lightning seemed to agree with me.  
"…Yeah. Lets do it. Everyone, we`re pulling away from the battle for now and attack the carriers themselves instead! Thunderbolt, you want in on this?"  
"Sounds like a job for me, alright." Thunderbolt responded with an audible grin. "Don´t wait for me though, get them while they`re hot."

For the next five minutes, an awkward silence hung over the cockpit, and I knew why- tension. This was her first live combat mission and my first flight in these blasted planegirl rigs. In either case, we were on the edge of our seats… seats that didn`t exist. And there was another thing, which I only noticed when she gave off an amused chuckle.  
"Feeling comfortable back there?"  
"Depends, really. Why do you ask?"  
"Because I don`t remember you bringing a gun into my rig."  
Oh. Seems like the G-forces tugging me left and right caused my groin to… rub against her butt, and naturally, my body reacted to that quite well.  
"Eh… well, sorry, I can`t help that." I tried to explain it this way, but she just laughed a bit more.  
"Is that so? Well, as long as it doesn`t distract you –too- much, Shichiro~"  
"You are pretty distracting, Lightning, I give you that. But i`ll manage."  
Of course, a lot of different thoughts came up in my head when she said it like this, and with this much body contact it was hard to imagine she wasn`t thinking alike. But before I could come to anything like asking her out, the coast came into sight, and anti aircraft guns were pointed at us.  
What I could only assume to be a barrel roll at mach speeds pulled me over violently, tossing me against the side of the cockpit, as explosions happened left and right of us, and Lightning flew another violent maneuver.  
"Damn, they found us right away…!" She cursed, and after pulling the plane into a straight again, she plunged right down to the sea to give off a gun-salvo against the nearest Wo-class.  
That sight- seeing it obliterated by armor piercing, and high explosive shells… it briefly made me shudder. It was if I could feel her eyes staring at me while her body was being torn into bits. …however, the sight of the Admiral, glaring red eyes at us was something that shook me more, and it didn`t take a second for me start lining up my sights with her.  
Just as the trigger was pressed, though, Lightning yanked the plane around to avoid enemy fire, and it instead crashed into the rig the woman was standing on, which started to sink… or rather, submerge, by the looks of things. "Gh…! Damn, she`s getting away…!"  
"No can do, Shichiro, one of those shells hitting us would be the end of this trip. Focus on the rest of them." Lightning gave back, and I nodded slightly to myself, as a beep sounded in my ears. "Whats that…?"  
"It's a warning, we`ve exceeded 35 minutes, more than half the air supply. This wasn`t meant to be a long flight, you know. Don`t worry though, we`ve got about… 30 percent fuel left, and your pill should last for another hour."  
"I don`t think i´d be concerned about getting sick when I suffocate, Lightning!"  
Another jerk to the side, and a few shells popping out of our guns followed. "If the tank is empty, take off the mask, you`d have about 15 minutes more by breathing in whats inside the cockpit. After that… well, I won`t let it come to that." Good to hear she was concerned about me, but that anti aircraft fire… we won´t be able to escape it forever.  
"Musashi, Tenryuu, come in. Where are you?"  
A thunderous booming sound, repeated eight times in short succession, followed, and two Wo-class carriers were sunk by a barrage of 46cm shells, tearing them into scrap metal with ease.  
"Musashi is right here! Do not worry. …Moreover, where are you, Admiral?"  
"Above you. That jet fighter trying to survive the AA gun fire. I trust you can do something about that…?"  
"In the airpla-?" Musashi seemed to be quite taken aback by this, understandably so. "Very well, I will. Stay alive, Admiral." It sounded as if she was going to add something, but didn`t have the guts, or if she was too prideful to say that. Still, telling me to stay alive was a subtle hint that she cared about me at least a little.  
"The planes are coming back!" Lightning yelped as a few plinking noises rang from the back end of the plane, forcing her to turn up and under. "Now we`re getting sandwiched…!"  
"No you wont, keep your panties on…!" A sweep of Thunderbolt later, the ten enemy fighters engaging us were falling into the ocean- that cannon of hers was quite something, and after she had gotten rid of her bomb payload, one of the heavily armed Ra-class carriers broke apart and sank to the ground, damaged beyond repair. I was about to engage one of the Wo`s next, but… Tenryuu beat me to it.  
She leaped out of the water (Which I didn`t even know shipgirls could do) to ram that machete-like sword of hers into the chest of the first Wo-class, twisting it around to aim her turrets at the other one- her two 20,3 cm dual turrets blew the carrier deck straight off of the Abyssal, only to be greeted by the stick of the first Wo hitting Tenryuu in the face. Ow.  
I could see Musashi, that massive thing down in the ocean, helping her out with a secondary gun salvo which sank the carrier that hit her… the other one sank to the bottom of the sea, but so slowly, I wasn`t sure if she was actually defeated.  
A chill ran down my spine.  
She was looking up, at me, that Wo, and kept staring until after her eyes vanished in the water.  
This sight lingered in my mind for a few minutes, but then I had to turn my attention away- as Lightning flew low for a final attack on the last Ra-class carrier.  
Its AA guns pointed up at us, and in return, the main gun rattled a crescendo of violence- I lined up my sights, and fired the last few rockets in our arsenal at the steel behemoth…. Musashi`s second volley of shells did the rest, but…

..something rocked our aircraft, and we were slanting over to the side, a whirring noise coming from the back.  
"Lightning?!"  
"Left engine is offline, lost all power. I`m shutting off the right one so we can stabilize."  
Said and done, she slowly rolled the aircraft back over, the whirring noise gone, but also the humming of the engines. We were gliding, but we could only do so for so long, and I did start to notice a lack of oxygen in my tank…  
"…crud, the tailplane`s stuck, I can`t turn around. Guess we´ll have to land instead of splashing down." Lightning commented, as calm as if it was just another day on the grind.  
I was not so calm, especially as I felt nothing came out of the airhose anymore. Hectically, I pulled my arms up and unhooked it, breathing in the musky, sweat filled air of the cockpit in deep intakes.  
"L-lightning…!"  
"We`ll be down there in five minutes or less." She wasn`t kidding. I could see the coast approaching fast, and behind the sandy beach came lush vegetation… the problem being that under those tropical trees wasn´t grass or undergrowth, but ruins of hotels and tourist traps which would be very hard to land on. Seems like Lightning was aware, and steered over where the trees cleared up… then a crack, and a ripping sound occurred, and we dropped.  
"C-crap! That was the damaged tailplane…!" I could feel her pull a lever, a hissing noise inflating the raft under us- likely to dampen the impact, but in the end of it all, she yanked out another lever to blow the lid, and eject us out. The force of the wind hit me like a punch in the guts, while Lightning tightly wrapped her arms around me and brought us down- we were below parachuting height, and thus she turned onto her back to break the fall for me… still, I felt the impact on the green below me, and went out cold.

Birds chirping in the trees- a distant noise I only knew from television programs… gentle hands cupping my face, something soft and warm wrapping around my nose and… blowing air inside, making me choke and sputter as soon as my consciousness came back in full.  
"G—gh..!" I pushed Lightning off, coughing a bit. "Wh... mouth to mouth, damn you, not mouth to nose…!"  
"But that's what I learned in first aid class." Huffing a bit, she sat back, crossing her arms in a pout, allowing me to take a look around… the crashed plane was next to us, more or less intact aside from the obvious hit from the AA gun shell and the missing top half. It stopped against a large tree, which we were sitting under… the sun was starting to set, and we were very much alone.  
"…thank you for pulling me out of there, Lightning." I began, trying to break the ice before it formed.  
"…Well, you were above me, so it was either that or kicking you out." Slowly a smile formed on her face again, and she looked back to me. "Still, that was a pretty bad way to say 'Thank you for saving my life' just now!"  
"Thank you for saving my life, I really appreciate it. My nostrils feel very clean now."  
"Not that either, dammit!" She started to laugh, and her fist hit my shoulder with a bump, pushing me over a bit- I didn`t resist, just laid back, letting things pass over me and the adrenalin rush fade.  
Grinning, Lightning came up to my side, lying down as well, watching me relax- then, she poked my cheek to get my attention.  
"Hey, don´t doze off again. I`d be all alone here."  
Ah, that would be bad, huh. With a grin, I rolled over to face her and poked back.  
"So? Just take a nap with me."  
"Don`t wanna. When the rescue team arrives, you`ll be going back to your fleet, and i`ll be depraved of the best wingman i`ve ever had." Ah, so that's what she was going for.  
"I`ll be your wingman anytime, Light. Just call me." Her face fell a bit… did I say something bad?  
"…I`m not sure i´ll still be around then, you know. Miss Yamamoto probably didn`t tell you, but…we planegirls don`t last very long. Brand new technology, you know… accidents happen all the time, and if we`re getting into real combat now, causality rates will skyrocket."  
The light hearted, almost romantic feeling passed, and was left with dread, the fear of loss, and bleak feelings… this might be the last time I see this cheerful, curious girl. War was hell, but until now I didn`t really think about that.  
"Not if you give your best out there, and make sure to come back alive. I`ll promise to come visit you whenever I can… your commander is my sister, afterall."  
"Don´t make a girl a promise if you know you can´t keep it. You have your own duties and obligations."  
A smirk crossed my lips. "I`ll make room in my schedule for you."  
"Am I worth that much to be squeezed inbetween meeting politicians and fighting battles?"  
"You`re worth a lot more, Lightning. No matter how many planegirls are out there and how many are being built, there´s only one of you. Don´t make light of yourself. Fight to survive, and for those who care about you and you`ll come back alive everytime."  
She raised an eyebrow questioningly. "Isn`t that a nice way of saying 'fight for me'…?"  
I felt her hand clench around the upper part of my overall, trembling a bit… so I reached over, cupped her shoulder, and pulled her close into an embrace.  
"Maybe for me, but for Akiha too, and your fellow planegirls. They might not say it, but they`d miss you… just like you would miss them. Just think of all the people who would miss you- and tell yourself that you have to come back, for their sake."  
"Shichiro…" She brought out, gazing up to me. "…shut up, I get it. Don´t waste this moment with bad feelings. I want to have fun, like we had up there."  
It wasn´t that much fun for me but- I was unable to respond, as the next thing that happened were her lips pushing against mine, sealing them with pink wet velvet.

It took me a few moments to react to this, but… it felt nice, it felt.. right, and afterall, I had already found out Lightning was just as attractive as the shipgirls to me. Still, she was wild, much more so than I expected- her hands ran down my overall, feeling up the outlines of my body underneath while we exchanged ever more fierce kisses- my first one had happened moments ago, but it was forgotten quite fast with the more and more out of control situation.  
Out of control was my mind, as well. Logic had turned itself off, I forgot of possible consequences regarding to this affair, and of my duties as a commander of shipgirls- which this girl was not.  
My body did what it wanted, and I couldn`t resist…

To our greatest fortune, we did dress ourselves properly in time before the rescue party arrived, a truck which loaded the broken rig onto its back, and a few paramedics which looked me over for a few minutes… next to the truck, I could see Tenryuu and Musashi standing by, waiting for me to be released, but I could tell this might take a while so I gestured them over.  
"Hey, you two… nice work out there." While Musashi`s performance had been breathtaking, Tenryuu was the one who deserved more praise- afterall, a light cruiser fighting a standard carrier and winning was not an everyday occurence, but Musashi was built to sink big ships.  
"Yeah yeah, its no big thing." The purple haired one gave back, crossing her arms behind her head. "So, you hurt or something?"  
Musashi said nothing.  
"No, i`m fine. I`ll be going home with you guys as soon as they release me… and after I said goodbye to my sister." I grinned back at them, but Tenryuu only nodded slightly. She seemed a bit… pale, and Musashi kept switching which leg she was resting on, nervously. "…whats with you guys?"  
"We saw your plane fall out of the sky and crash, and nobody could tell us if you were alive or not. This was not only reckless and unnecessary, but quite a grave mistake to make for a leader such as you, Admiral!" Musashi finally spoke up, glancing at me disapprovingly. Uh oh. This was… quite the stern look, even more so than what she used to look like. I suppose she had a point, but…  
"We`re at war, it's not like it's unreasonable to die in battle. …Still, thanks for the concern, I gue-"  
She turned around and left, and Tenryuu watched after her, before shrugging her shoulders with a sigh.  
"Well, there she goes. But oi, didn´t take you for an adrenalin junkie."  
"I have good reasons for doing that, Tenryuu, and I don`t think I'll do it again either." At least not in the near future, because just thinking back to that flight, now that the pills stopped working, made my knees shake. "This was a one-time thing, to help the planegirls get off the ground as a member of the airforce. …Seems like Musashi isn`t going to listen to that, though…"

Saying goodbye was brief, but much more heartfelt than the greeting was. Akiha reached her hand out to me, after a serious scolding for doing things on my own, getting her girls and myself in danger. As I took that hand, though, she let go of her cane for a brief moment to wrap an arm around me, giving an embrace, and quietly, very quietly thanking me for the good work.  
The planegirls saluted in front of me, some of them grinning at the behavior of their commander, Lightning grinning quite knowingly for a whole different reason, and I returned the favor with a promise to them all i´d be visiting again soon.  
How soon, I didn´t know, but I had a feeling this would not be the last time we`d cross paths.  
Compared to this, coming home almost felt cold at first, Bismarck and the others simply stood still and saluted, some of them nervous, while Musashi went off on her own, without saying a word.  
"Welcome home, Kommandant. I see you are well, that is good." Bismarck addressed me, and I nodded in return, dismissing the rest of the fleet.  
"Yes, barely. I had an encounter with the Abyssals, but… I survived, that's the main thing. How is the fleet doing?"  
She swallowed hard, and looked aside. "Well… We are doing good, ja. But… how shall I put this… I may have made a mistake."  
"A mistake? We all make those, Bismarck. No need to worry too much. …what did you do?" I asked her in a calm and gentle voice, resting my hand on her shoulder to make her relax a bit. It didn`t help much, she twitched in response to it.  
"There… there was an option I had not yet seen, called Large Ship Constru-"  
"Oh fucking hell." I groaned, and seconds later, a squeak I had never heard from Musashi before was voiced.  
"Ah-aaahh?!" Looking over to her, I discovered a destroyer popping her head out from underneath her skirt, where she had been… rather interested in what Musashi wore underneath. The grey haired girl had a rather interesting hairstyle, but otherwise seemed like nothing special.  
"Yes! Its me, Battleship Kiyoshimo!" ….Somehow, I felt like going back to Akiha. There was no way that little girl, which barely reached my chest, was a battleship. Still, the way she hugged Musashi`s legs amused me to no end, and the Yamato-class´s efforts to shake her off added to that effect.  
"Is that all, Bismarck? Because honestly, I don`t mind if she`s the result of that LSC. Just going to have to give the fairies a scolding."  
"Ah, well… our resources, they have been… depleted." Bismarck clenched her eyes shut and prepared to be yelled at, and the entire room went silent, but I simply nodded in return. I had expected that sooner or later…. Not this early, and not for that reason, but I made my mind up about it.  
"Okay. Contact the resource division then, and order a stock of thousand units each, i`ll pick out my bank account details for you for the transaction." The german`s face nearly fell apart completely, and Musashi`s glasses dropped off her nose.  
"But… but sir?! That's.. that's YOUR money, for a mistake I made…!" I gave her a smile, tucked the cap off her head and patted her blonde head a few times.  
"So what? Everyone makes mistakes, and I didn`t exactly explain you what that option is… so its my fault too. I don´t need the money I earn from this job, not as much as the fleet does right now. Use it without hesitation."  
Bismarck`s reddened cheeks were briefly tainted with tears, but she wiped them away as quickly as they appeared, and put her cap back on, snatching it away. "Y-yes…" With this, she hurried off without waiting for my dismissal, not wanting to lose her tough act like this.  
In truth, this was an easy decision after the lessons I had learned today… my parents, my grandparents and my brother were gone. But I wasn`t alone… the shipgirls around me, that supported me and depended on me… they could be called a family too. My family. For them, I would gladly spend what I earned from naval command- if they smiled in return, then it was well spent.

Later that day, after I had taken a shower and changed into a new uniform, I was working late in the office- I couldn`t find sleep in this bed of mine, for one reason or another. On the other hand, turning and twisting around for six or seven hours wouldn`t make a whole lot of sense if I would be dead tired the next day either way, so I decided to get up, and get working on some of the paperwork that I would be missing on the next day, when my body gave out and i´d be sleeping on the job.  
I was able to do that for about an hour, before someone decided to come check on me… someone I hadn`t been expecting.  
"Admiral. What are you doing." Musashi asked, raising an eyebrow at me. Her face, despite having hints of anger on it, showed genuine concern.  
"I can`t sleep, Musashi. So I might as well work some more."  
"That's not good for you." Was her response, and her hand pinned mine, which was holding a pen at the moment, down on the table with restrictive force.  
"Didn`t think you`d care. You looked like you were back to hating me when we were rescued earlier." I commented, ignoring her glance about it. "Or did you ever stop hating me in the first place?"  
"I never –started- hating you, Admiral. But when you´re being this unreasonable, reckless and intolerant toward your coworkers, I can´t help but be disappointed in your performance as our leader."  
"I told you I had a reason for doing this." I grunted, looking up at her directly. "The planegirls were about to be disbanded, unless they´d have some military record soon. Akiha wouldn`t have let them move out like this, so I took it upon me to give them something for that record."  
"That wasn`t your job. Your job would have been to motivate their commander, not to jump in a plane with one of them despite having no idea how to fly a plane!" Musashi bellowed back, clutching my hand tighter.  
"Are you lecturing me how to do my job now, or are you just jealous that I was fighting along the planegirls instead of fighting along you?!"  
Her hand was painfully gripping mine now, and I could see her teeth being bared- this was about to escalate, as I could tell…

"…Don´t be ridiculous. You´re our commander. You have no place in the battlefield, but here." Musashi seemed to calm down a bit, letting go of my hand. "As long as you don´t forget that, you`re going to stay alive."  
"…so that was what you were worried about, that I might die." It did make sense in context. Musashi´s military period was late in the war, where kamikaze bombers became common and planes started to sink battleships like her with ease. It was less jealousy, but fear for airplanes that she had.  
"….yes. Yes, I was worried you´d die. And I wasn´t far off, because you crashed in the middle of nowhere."  
"I`m sorry, Musashi." That got her attention. I suddenly apologized, taking her out of the rant she was going on about.  
"What?!"  
"I`m sorry. I should`ve considered how you feel about it. Afterall, I could`ve died, and then this base would be disbanded. I´ll be more careful, more considerate about it next time."  
The tanned battleship stared at me incredulously, rosy cheeks and an open mouth telling me just how much I had caught her off guard. It took several seconds, but eventually she closed her mouth, turned around and began to walk off again.  
"Don`t work for too long."  
"Musashi, wait." I called after her, and stood up. "Wait. Don´t go yet. What did you actually come here for?"  
"This Musashi, you´re confusing her." There she went again, talking in this high and mighty third person speech, looking back over her shoulder at me.  
"You came here for a reason, and not to lecture me like that. What did you want?"  
Caught off guard once more, Musashi blinked, and took a few seconds before she turned back around, looking away from me.  
"….I was going to ask if, since you`re still awake, you`d watch another movie with me."  
A slight grin appeared on my face.  
"Might as well. Its not like i´ll get a lot of work done in this sleepy state."

So in the end of the day, there we were again just like before, sitting in the hobby room together, watching a documentary of the war in the Leyte Gulf from beginning to end. It was the standard stuff, nothing I hadn´t heard of before, with some still pictures of Musashi and Yamato taken from afar, and a few CGI scene showing the battles of them… but a single mention got my attention.  
Prior to her last battle, Musashi was used to transfer the urn containing the ashes of the fallen Admiral Yamamoto to its final resting place.  
…suddenly it all became clear to me why she was so dead scared.  
She already lost someone with my name in the past, and had been close to losing another one…  
The difference was that she never knew my ancestor, but we had spent some time together now, got a bit familiar… I shouldn`t have been so careless. What did I research her history for to make such a dense mistake?!  
Reaching over to her hand, I grasped it gently and held it as that scene passed by, and after some bashfulness passed by, she held mine as well, and we remained like this for the rest of the movie…

…which both of us never saw, because even Musashi fell asleep with how boring it was.


	9. Warships and Airplanes (NSFW)

While the girls i had met before- Tomcat, Tornado, Phantom and Thunderbolt, rushed over to the hangar and got into their suits, i took a moment to glance up into the sky- it was clear, not too warm and not too cold- perfect weather. As if it didn`t matter that i was here, they would`ve flown anyway.  
At least i`d like to think that, to calm my nerves and get on a different train of thought, but someone ruined that for me already, as Lightning poked my shoulder with a grin, and pointed over to a slightly larger rig, thicker in build, with longer wingspan.  
"What are you stargazing for, Shichiro? You`re going to watch us- firsthand."  
"W-wait. What? You mean… inside one of those? But i`m not a-" She cut me off with a grin, as Akiha came over with a mask and an overall in her hands, looking a bit smug… as smug as that woman could get with her constantly stern face. The hand holding the cane also had a small box of… something in it, but for now she just pushed the overall and the mask in my hand.  
"Put that on, unless you want to faint up there. The air pressure`s not that high at forty thousand feet, you know." Her voice made it fairly clear that I had no saying in this, and with a sigh, I nodded and resigned to my fate, as they showed me to a dressing room, in which I slid out of my all too comfortable uniform and into a somewhat tight overall in a blue color. I could only guess the color coding was relevant to the rank, or the role the person wearing it had- green for the fighters, black for the bombers, and blue for the… guests.  
"Here, take one of those too. It helps against the sickness the G-forces will do to you." The small box turned out to be pills, and she handed me one… with a grimace, I swallowed it, then put on the mask… which surely made me look like a monster from a sixties horror movie, but Akiha gave it an approving glance and gestured off to the plane rig, which Lightning was opening up at this point.

A noise came from above… I peeked up, and very faintly, I could make out the outline of an Abyssal jet, its green exhausts leaving a corona in the sky. …that wasn`t a target drone, was it? No one was airborne yet.  
…that was not good.  
"Akiha!" I called over, but she didn`t hear me- reluctantly, I went back to Lightning and the others to warn them at least.  
"Whats with the yelling, Shichiro?" She asked, tilting her head in a cute manner, but I had no eyes for that in the moment.  
"A recon plane of the Abyss..! I saw it just now, flying overhead!"  
Tornado rolled her eyes, then crossed her arms while glancing at me.  
"Its probably one of the target drones they started pre-maturely. Don´t get your panties into a bunch, naval guy."  
"Think first, then open your mouth." Phantom responded in a harsh, but cold tone. "Why would they start a single drone before any of us is airborne? We need a minute or two to get stable. The naval guy has a point."  
"We should stay aground, then. Just to be safe." Tomcat suggested, but I didn`t think that was a good idea. They needed victories- they wouldn´t get any by avoiding fights like this.  
"Rather than that, load live ammo into your guns and go up there- that single plane isn`t going to be alone if it spots us down here, you know. Warships or fighter planes- both have the same basic purpose. Protect their home. You`d fail at that task if you would let this place get bombed."  
The five stared at me for a few seconds, Lightning especially, before Thunderbolt grinned wide and slammed her little fist into her palm. "Hell yes! Lets get up there and show them what we`re made of!"  
"I suppose this is what we trained for." Phantom agreed, nodding a single time.  
"It is, yeah. Lets grab some ammo and some missiles… and you, Thunderbolt, you put on some bombs, too, then we`ll blow up whoever sent that plane up." Tomcat gave off, in a rare display of enthusiasm.  
Lightning seemed like she was about to facepalm, but then she was just smiling with a hint of disappointment. "Alright then, i`ll get into my regular rig. Get into shelter with Miss Yamamoto, and-"  
For a split second I considered that, getting into safety and letting her handle it. But that look of disappointment told me she really, really wanted to fly with me… and damn it, it might be fun afterall.  
I grinned at her, and gave the big plane rig a pat. "I already swallowed that awful pill, Lightning. I`ll fly with you no matter what."  
"But… that's a real combat mission now, not just a drill… you might be killed, you know."  
What else was new. I could get killed every day. This job came with danger, and i`ve been looking it in the eye more than once by now. I gave her a nod. "Yeah. But I can try and help to make sure you aren't. Just get in, and tell me what to do."

Meanwhile, a few miles away from our position, Admiral Nimitz and Aircraft Carrier Demon seemed satisfied as their recon flight returned, reporting a clear signal for the first bombing raid.  
With a sign of her hand, Carrier ordered the ships submerged at the shore to raise- four Wo-class carriers, and two brand new Ra-class heavy carriers- Abyssals lying flat down on the water, fitted with rigs the size of the Carrier demon`s own, each one carrying five of the new Shi-class heavy bombers- formerly destroyers, they were refurbished into girls that resembled a mechanical, bizarre rendition of an eagle, carrying large bombs and a pair of miniguns each, a cluster five regular jet engines used by the Abyssal planes, mounted on each leg, gave them the thrust needed to take off. Their "beaks" were made of a hardened material, capable of piercing through a tank during a nosedive, which made them useable for suicide attacks, and while their heavier bodies meant less mobility and speed, the smaller planes from the Wo-classes would protect them in the case of resistance.  
"Recon reports clear weather and no enemy activity. Seems like the perfect conditions for a test run." Carrier said to her superior, who nodded to her with crossed arms.  
"Yes. Proceed as planned- a wave of standard fighters, then the first Shi-class group, followed by another wave of fighters to guard their backs- and repeat that with the other group. First group targets the hangar, the second targets the bigger house." Nimitz commanded, looking ahead to the faint outline of the airbase.  
"Aye-aye. …If only Airfield Princess could see this, she`d be so mad." Carrier responded with a smirk, and gave another hand signal, followed by a mutter of words unable to be understand by humans- the maws of the Wo-class carrier decks then opened, extending a catapult each, before firing off jet fighters, one after another, until a total of five were in the air- then, the Ra-class on the left side brought their attack bombers into the sky, and the Wo`s followed up with more planes of their own. Getting into formation, they headed straight for Henderson…

With the other four girls being locked into catapult-like contraptions, I was the last one left behind- Lightning had taken her place, lying down in the plane rig and holding onto controls and handlebars, before giving a light nod. "Your turn."  
"Mine? .. where`s the second sea- wait, I have to lie down on top of you?"  
She nodded again. "That's the idea."  
"You can`t be serious…" I moaned a bit, but eventually succumbed to my fate, climbing inside and lying down… it was comfortable, all the spaces for my limbs were there, I could reach the handlebars alright- if only I wasn`t tightly pressed against Lightnings back, it would be quite alright. That, and the feeling of claustrophobia that hit me as soon as the lid closed, and bolts clicked into place.  
"Alright, we´re locked in. Switching to auxiliary air supply." She responded, and all of the sudden, I got fresh air blown into my mask in gentle puffs. "Air supply ready. Fuel linkage established… I have control. Turning on display."  
"Woah!" Next, the seemingly standard pressure mask I wore lit up from the inside, and on a thin layered LCD screen, it displayed the inside of the hangar, as an HUD came up in the corners of my sight, and crosshairs, labeled "No weapon selected" appeared in the middle. "Do you see that too?"  
"Don`t have to. I feel it." I could hear her grinning, and it didn`t take a genius to imagine she enjoyed this whole situation. No wonder she wanted to do this so bad, her butt was quite firmly pressed against my crotch, and I imagine under acceleration this would get a whole lot worse. I had no time to think about that, though, as the roof of the hangar was pulled away, the catapult extended, and the entire plane, us included, was pointed almost 90 degrees up to the sky.  
"Is that normal…?" I asked with a bit of hesitation.  
"Yep. In the next ten seconds we`ll be fired off with nearly 200 kilometers an hour. Then the engines kick in, and we soar off into the sky." Lightning explained, not making me feel any better. That sounded quite like a brutal kick-off, and my suspicions turned out to be quite true.  
From one second to another, I felt like someone punched me in the back as the whole rig suddenly catapulted forward, pressing me closer to Lightning than I ever wanted to- Okay, that was a lie, I was starting to enjoy being close to her, but the G-forces practically crushing me was not fun. As I got a bearing of myself, we were already above ground, seventy meters in fact, according to my HUD, and I panicked for a second before my pilot chuckled.  
"Relax, Shichiro. I got things under control." A whining noise passed by, and I could feel a blasting force firing out the exhausts. The engines were on now, and my arms began to move along with the wings of the plane, as we turned over into a horizontal position.  
"….Wow." I brought out, seeing the view from up there, the tiny buildings underneath, the endless blue we were about to dive into.  
"…And that's why I love being a planegirl." Lightning commented softly, doing a few gentle maneuvers to make sure everything worked right. In the distance, our radar picked up the first hostiles, but she seemed to take her time…  
"Lightning. Fifteen… no, thirty hostiles approaching our position, they`re splitting up into groups…"  
"Don`t you worry about it!" Tomcats voice came from the radio, and from underneath us her plane suddenly came up, a few puffs of smoke and some thumping noises later, tracer rounds soared through the sky and cut one of the Abyssal jets into pieces. That's when they spread out, attempting to circle us.  
"Tomcat, you fucking idiot…!" Lightning bursted out, pulling a harsh curve to the left which made my fingers grow numb from the forces. "Now the element of surprise is gone!"  
"Shooting clay traps out of the sky is no fun, Light! We have them outnumbered anyways, by a hundred!"  
"Tch." She grumbled, pulling the plane straight again. "Shichiro, this is going to get rough and hard, I hope you`re prepared. In a fight like this, I can´t stop and turn over just because you`re sick."  
"Don´t worry about it, turn around, we`ve got one on our tail." I commented, not seeing anything, but I could hear an engine approaching.  
"Wai… oh shit, you`re right." What shook me next was a barrel roll, as bullets fizzed through the sky and missed us, scratching the paintjob a few times, before Lightning suddenly pulled a J-turn out of nowhere, attacking one of the jets with a burst from our main gun.

"Admiral..! I`m receiving report… that our fighters are… being attacked!" Carrier gave off, turning her head to Nimitz quickly. "It appears… those planegirls can start… faster than we expected."  
"Let them. We`ve got more than enough to put a stop to this… start the rest of the jets, Wo-class." The Admiral looked over to the leading Wo, which nodded a single time with a determined "Wo." Coming from its mouth, before reaching her arm out ahead- once again its carrier deck opened, and planes poured out of it in droves, this time, not stopping at just five.

"Don´t bother with the little ones, Lightning- they`re just protecting the big ones." By the time I told her this, it became more and more obvious just how little value the regular planes had, as a seemingly endless amount of them came from the coast.  
"Shit…! While you`re here, Shichiro, make yourself useful. There`s a button and a trigger on each of your handlebars- the button engages the target lock-on, the trigger fires a missile. I`ll handle the main gun." She just said that so lightly, as if I had been doing that all my life, and before I knew it the aforementioned trigger swung out from the previously smooth handle.  
"H-how do you expect me to handle this…?! I never fired rockets before!"  
I could hear her snicker.  
"Its simple, just point and fire. The warheads guidance will take care of the rest." She made it sound so easy, but I suppose it was due to the whole seeking missile thing. But that would only work with a lock-on, and while she was racing around at eight hundred kilometers an hour, dodging enemy fire…!  
Then I noticed something, a pattern emerging in their movements. Those bombers were nothing like we`d ever seen before, and judging from their armament they were extremely dangerous, but…  
I took my chance. Without waiting for the lock-on, I pulled the trigger as soon as the aircraft was in the right position, left of the nearest bomber- at that time, a rotating rig, holding twelve small missiles emerged from the belly of the aircraft and launched a single one, which soared straight ahead. As Tomcat engaged it, it flew off to the left, as predicted- and detonated violently, the large bombs they carried racking up the force into a chain reaction.  
"Wha..?! You.. you didn`t even aim! And with the first shot too! What kind of luck do you have, dammit?!" Lightning complained, pulling over harshly to avoid an engaging group of smaller fighters, which were then taken out by Tomcats main gun.  
"I noticed they always fly off to the left when they avoid something. So I fired one to the left just as Tomcat was about to target it." I explained, starting to feel a bit nauseous from the constant movement of my surroundings… she really wasn´t kidding about how rough this was.  
"Ah…! Kinda like with the Zeros, huh? Alright…! Lightning, calling everyone- the big bombers always dodge to the left! Try to make use of that!"  
A plinking noise caught my ear, and I shuddered at the thought of what it was- Lightning didn´t seem disturbed by it, and the plane seemed to work fine, but… without armor plating, I didn`t feel very safe with vehicles that were being shot at.  
"Phantom here. Caught one- Target locked. Firing lance one." Not much of a talker, was she. Still, the resulting explosion was quite nice to look at… what wasn`t nice was to see one of the bombers drop their payload.  
"Lightning…! They´re dropping bombs on the barracks…!"  
"Keep your shirt on. I`ve seen it."  
My stomatch then went into a direction I didn`t want it to go as we went for a nosedive, our 20mm autocannons making short work of the bombs in midair, before she pulled the plane… or rather, herself, back up, where the bomber was caught in a dive-attack of Tornado. Seven of them were left, and three dozen fighters… My trigger finger twitched off another rocket, but rather than catching the bomber I had aimed for, it hit a fighter head-on and brought five of them that were closeby to the ground.  
"This is one hell of a training drill…!" It came from Thunderbolt, the slowest one- but also the most powerful, as I was about to find out. A short burst from her main gun made the airplane stall in midair as the breeze of bullets cut a line through the enemy aircraft, destroying the enemy bomber they were hiding. They weren´t using their gatling guns at all… perhaps they weren`t meant to be used in dogfighting.  
"…Admiral Yamamoto… Come in, Admiral." It came from my headset, and I nearly fired off a rocket at the surprise of it. That was…  
"Musashi?! Whats going on?"  
The noise of machinery, mainly electric motors and elevators was heard in the background. "Tenryuu and I have made contact with a number of enemy carriers, roughly fourty miles from your current position. Tenryuu says that the human with them is their commander… permission to engage?"  
Human… that woman from before, she meant. Gritting my teeth, I nodded slowly.  
"Granted. Focus fire on the carriers, though. We need to stop them at the source. ..Lightning, pull over."  
"What?!" It bursted from her, baffled. "We can´t leave the fight now!"  
"We won`t. Forty miles from here, the carriers are defenselessly waiting for their planes to return… the planegirl airforce needs some good results, so lets blow them up while we can!"  
That was a bold plan, afterall, that woman could have things in store I was not even remotely aware of, we were in a slow, two seater training jet, and we were up against a multitude of abyssal ships… but to hell with it, I wasn´t going to let this go.  
Lightning seemed to agree with me.  
"…Yeah. Lets do it. Everyone, we`re pulling away from the battle for now and attack the carriers themselves instead! Thunderbolt, you want in on this?"  
"Sounds like a job for me, alright." Thunderbolt responded with an audible grin. "Don´t wait for me though, get them while they`re hot."

For the next five minutes, an awkward silence hung over the cockpit, and I knew why- tension. This was her first live combat mission and my first flight in these blasted planegirl rigs. In either case, we were on the edge of our seats… seats that didn`t exist. And there was another thing, which I only noticed when she gave off an amused chuckle.  
"Feeling comfortable back there?"  
"Depends, really. Why do you ask?"  
"Because I don`t remember you bringing a gun into my rig."  
Oh. Seems like the G-forces tugging me left and right caused my groin to… rub against her butt, and naturally, my body reacted to that quite well.  
"Eh… well, sorry, I can`t help that." I tried to explain it this way, but she just laughed a bit more.  
"Is that so? Well, as long as it doesn`t distract you –too- much, Shichiro~"  
"You are pretty distracting, Lightning, I give you that. But i`ll manage."  
Of course, a lot of different thoughts came up in my head when she said it like this, and with this much body contact it was hard to imagine she wasn`t thinking alike. But before I could come to anything like asking her out, the coast came into sight, and anti aircraft guns were pointed at us.  
What I could only assume to be a barrel roll at mach speeds pulled me over violently, tossing me against the side of the cockpit, as explosions happened left and right of us, and Lightning flew another violent maneuver.  
"Damn, they found us right away…!" She cursed, and after pulling the plane into a straight again, she plunged right down to the sea to give off a gun-salvo against the nearest Wo-class.  
That sight- seeing it obliterated by armor-piercing, and high explosive shells… it briefly made me shudder. It was if I could feel her eyes staring at me while her body was being torn into bits. …however, the sight of the Admiral, glaring red eyes at us was something that shook me more, and it didn`t take a second for me start lining up my sights with her.  
Just as the trigger was pressed, though, Lightning yanked the plane around to avoid enemy fire, and it instead crashed into the rig the woman was standing on, which started to sink… or rather, submerge, by the looks of things. "Gh…! Damn, she`s getting away…!"  
"No can do, Shichiro, one of those shells hitting us would be the end of this trip. Focus on the rest of them." Lightning gave back, and I nodded slightly to myself, as a beep sounded in my ears. "Whats that…?"  
"It's a warning, we`ve exceeded 35 minutes, more than half the air supply. This wasn`t meant to be a long flight, you know. Don`t worry though, we`ve got about… 30 percent fuel left, and your pill should last for another hour."  
"I don`t think i´d be concerned about getting sick when I suffocate, Lightning!"  
Another jerk to the side, and a few shells popping out of our guns followed. "If the tank is empty, take off the mask, you`d have about 15 minutes more by breathing in whats inside the cockpit. After that… well, I won`t let it come to that." Good to hear she was concerned about me, but that anti aircraft fire… we won´t be able to escape it forever.  
"Musashi, Tenryuu, come in. Where are you?"  
A thunderous booming sound, repeated eight times in short succession, followed, and two Wo-class carriers were sunk by a barrage of 46cm shells, tearing them into scrap metal with ease.  
"Musashi is right here! Do not worry. …Moreover, where are you, Admiral?"  
"Above you. That jet fighter trying to survive the AA gun fire. I trust you can do something about that…?"  
"In the airpla-?" Musashi seemed to be quite taken aback by this, understandably so. "Very well, I will. Stay alive, Admiral." It sounded as if she was going to add something, but didn`t have the guts, or if she was too prideful to say that. Still, telling me to stay alive was a subtle hint that she cared about me at least a little.  
"The planes are coming back!" Lightning yelped as a few plinking noises rang from the back end of the plane, forcing her to turn up and under. "Now we`re getting sandwiched…!"  
"No you wont, keep your panties on…!" A sweep of Thunderbolt later, the ten enemy fighters engaging us were falling into the ocean- that cannon of hers was quite something, and after she had gotten rid of her bomb payload, one of the heavily armed Ra-class carriers broke apart and sank to the ground, damaged beyond repair. I was about to engage one of the Wo`s next, but… Tenryuu beat me to it.  
She leaped out of the water (Which I didn`t even know shipgirls could do) to ram that machete-like sword of hers into the chest of the first Wo-class, twisting it around to aim her turrets at the other one- her two 20,3 cm dual turrets blew the carrier deck straight off of the Abyssal, only to be greeted by the stick of the first Wo hitting Tenryuu in the face. Ow.  
I could see Musashi, that massive thing down in the ocean, helping her out with a secondary gun salvo which sank the carrier that hit her… the other one sank to the bottom of the sea, but so slowly, I wasn`t sure if she was actually defeated.  
A chill ran down my spine.  
She was looking up, at me, that Wo, and kept staring until after her eyes vanished in the water.  
This sight lingered in my mind for a few minutes, but then I had to turn my attention away- as Lightning flew low for a final attack on the last Ra-class carrier.  
Its AA guns pointed up at us, and in return, the main gun rattled a crescendo of violence- I lined up my sights, and fired the last few rockets in our arsenal at the steel behemoth…. Musashi`s second volley of shells did the rest, but…

..something rocked our aircraft, and we were slanting over to the side, a whirring noise coming from the back.  
"Lightning?!"  
"Left engine is offline, lost all power. I`m shutting off the right one so we can stabilize."  
Said and done, she slowly rolled the aircraft back over, the whirring noise gone, but also the humming of the engines. We were gliding, but we could only do so for so long, and I did start to notice a lack of oxygen in my tank…  
"…crud, the tailplane`s stuck, I can`t turn around. Guess we´ll have to land instead of splashing down." Lightning commented, as calm as if it was just another day on the grind.  
I was not so calm, especially as I felt nothing came out of the airhose anymore. Hectically, I pulled my arms up and unhooked it, breathing in the musky, sweat filled air of the cockpit in deep intakes.  
"L-lightning…!"  
"We`ll be down there in five minutes or less." She wasn`t kidding. I could see the coast approaching fast, and behind the sandy beach came lush vegetation… the problem being that under those tropical trees wasn´t grass or undergrowth, but ruins of hotels and tourist traps which would be very hard to land on. Seems like Lightning was aware, and steered over where the trees cleared up… then a crack, and a ripping sound occurred, and we dropped.  
"C-crap! That was the damaged tailplane…!" I could feel her pull a lever, a hissing noise inflating the raft under us- likely to dampen the impact, but in the end of it all, she yanked out another lever to blow the lid, and eject us out. The force of the wind hit me like a punch in the guts, while Lightning tightly wrapped her arms around me and brought us down- we were below parachuting height, and thus she turned onto her back to break the fall for me… still, I felt the impact on the green below me, and went out cold.

Birds chirping in the trees- a distant noise I only knew from television programs… gentle hands cupping my face, something soft and warm wrapping around my nose and… blowing air inside, making me choke and sputter as soon as my consciousness came back in full.  
"G—gh..!" I pushed Lightning off, coughing a bit. "Wh... mouth to mouth, damn you, not mouth to nose…!"  
"But that's what I learned in first aid class." Huffing a bit, she sat back, crossing her arms in a pout, allowing me to take a look around… the crashed plane was next to us, more or less intact aside from the obvious hit from the AA gun shell and the missing top half. It stopped against a large tree, which we were sitting under… the sun was starting to set, and we were very much alone.  
"…thank you for pulling me out of there, Lightning." I began, trying to break the ice before it formed.  
"…Well, you were above me, so it was either that or kicking you out." Slowly a smile formed on her face again, and she looked back to me. "Still, that was a pretty bad way to say 'Thank you for saving my life' just now!"  
"Thank you for saving my life, I really appreciate it. My nostrils feel very clean now."  
"Not that either, dammit!" She started to laugh, and her fist hit my shoulder with a bump, pushing me over a bit- I didn`t resist, just laid back, letting things pass over me and the adrenalin rush fade.  
Grinning, Lightning came up to my side, lying down as well, watching me relax- then, she poked my cheek to get my attention.  
"Hey, don´t doze off again. I`d be all alone here."  
Ah, that would be bad, huh. With a grin, I rolled over to face her and poked back.  
"So? Just take a nap with me."  
"Don`t wanna. When the rescue team arrives, you`ll be going back to your fleet, and i`ll be depraved of the best wingman i`ve ever had." Ah, so that's what she was going for.  
"I`ll be your wingman anytime, Light. Just call me." Her face fell a bit… did I say something bad?  
"…I`m not sure i´ll still be around then, you know. Miss Yamamoto probably didn`t tell you, but…we planegirls don`t last very long. Brand new technology, you know… accidents happen all the time, and if we`re getting into real combat now, causality rates will skyrocket."  
The light hearted, almost romantic feeling passed, and was left with dread, the fear of loss, and bleak feelings… this might be the last time I see this cheerful, curious girl. War was hell, but until now I didn`t really think about that.  
"Not if you give your best out there, and make sure to come back alive. I`ll promise to come visit you whenever I can… your commander is my sister, afterall."  
"Don´t make a girl a promise if you know you can´t keep it. You have your own duties and obligations."  
A smirk crossed my lips. "I`ll make room in my schedule for you."  
"Am I worth that much to be squeezed inbetween meeting politicians and fighting battles?"  
"You`re worth a lot more, Lightning. No matter how many planegirls are out there and how many are being built, there´s only one of you. Don´t make light of yourself. Fight to survive, and for those who care about you and you`ll come back alive everytime."  
She raised an eyebrow questioningly. "Isn`t that a nice way of saying 'fight for me'…?"  
I felt her hand clench around the upper part of my overall, trembling a bit… so I reached over, cupped her shoulder, and pulled her close into an embrace.  
"Maybe for me, but for Akiha too, and your fellow planegirls. They might not say it, but they`d miss you… just like you would miss them. Just think of all the people who would miss you- and tell yourself that you have to come back, for their sake."  
"Shichiro…" She brought out, gazing up to me. "…shut up, I get it. Don´t waste this moment with bad feelings. I want to have fun, like we had up there."  
It wasn´t that much fun for me but- I was unable to respond, as the next thing that happened were her lips pushing against mine, sealing them with pink wet velvet.

It took me a few moments to react to this, but… it felt nice, it felt.. right, and afterall, I had already found out Lightning was just as attractive as the shipgirls to me. Still, she was wild, much more so than I expected- her hands ran down my overall, feeling up the outlines of my body underneath while we exchanged ever more fierce kisses- my first one had happened moments ago, but it was forgotten quite fast with the more and more out of control situation.  
Out of control was my mind, as well. Logic had turned itself off, I forgot of possible consequences regarding to this affair, and of my duties as a commander of shipgirls- which this girl was not.  
My body did what it wanted, and I couldn`t resist…  
Some time when I had been distracted, her fingers slipped over the zipper of my suit, bringing it down, before her left hand slid inside to cup and feel around on my chest and sides. Her featherlight touches tickled, leaving shivers down my spine, but it was nothing compared to the sensation that hit me when our tongues met up and played with one another. I actually had to give off a moan from the feeling alone, it was intense and alien- my tongue felt on fire in the best way possible, and sensations kept running down my body- straight down the back to the groin.  
"Fuaa.." She breathed in, breaking the kiss for a moment to tug down my suit more, her hand reaching further down…. I tried to muster up the willpower to stop her, but her dexterous fingers wrapped around my trembling shaft in a manner that made my head spin. At first she clamped down on it too hard, being inexperienced, but hell, it was almost… cute, seeing her try out new things with me there.  
"Not so… hard.. its not a flight stick, Light.." I reminded her with a mutter, only to lean up and kiss the bit of her neck that was exposed, going up to nibble on her ear, making her squeak in a cute manner. I reached around her, feeling down her well-built back, but as I was nearing her butt she started moving down, which made my hands ride back up- it was then that I noticed my sleeves were missing, she had already pulled them down to strip me further of my overall.  
"Nngh?!" Looking down, I saw the reason why- she`d gone ahead and exposed my length, twitching and trembling for attention as it was, to the world and was currently nibbling along its side, her right hand caressing it with her silky fingertips, driving me even more crazy than I already was. "Light… h-how long until the rescue team arrives?"  
"Mmh… a while. I didn´t call for one yet." She answered, giving me a cocky grin while beginning to jerk her hand up and down, working me off. If she kept this up, I might not last as long as I hoped for my first time, so… I came up with a daring plan, and sat up to look at her.  
"Then maybe you should stop playing around down there and let me make you feel good, too."  
"Sounds like a plan..!"

Admittedly, this wasn´t my first time seeing a girl naked- Shiranui and Tenryuu had already taken that prized rank away from her. Still, it was my first time undressing one, and feeling her up- close up.  
Lightnings pale skin tasted salty, it was warm, moist, like she had been through a serious workout- maybe she did, I didn´t know how exhausting it was to fly this plane, but I made sure to relax her again, working my fingers over the muscles and crevices of her back, undoing tense spots, massaging her while gradually moving down her body, stripping her of the overall that hid the rest of the girl from me. Little gasps and mewls, ripples of her breath told me what she felt, and her shivers whenever I reached a good spot gave me a clear direction to go.. I loved the squeal she gave off when my tongue reached her belly button and licked it, or the soft hum when my lips pulled on her left nipple. Drawing lines and circles on her back with my middle finger, I reached down her body with my mouth, further and further until my hands touched her soft and yet firm buttocks, holding onto the spot where the legs ended and her butt began, gently spreading them a bit. I could tell she was getting flustered, and tried her best not to close up again, but I wasn´t going to stop here- if she tasted this good above, I needed a taste of what she was like below.  
A squeal, followed by a purring hum, was the answer to my tongue caressing her amazingly soft, silky folds that gave off a thick, syrupy fluid that I greedily collected and swallowed. That was a unique taste- salty, a bit fishy, and something between sweet and bitter… I needed to investigate this further, and collect more, much to her delight, as I felt her kick off the rest of the overall and wrap her legs around my shoulders, leaning back joyfully.  
I watched her body writhe and arch along with the movements of my tongue, and I was so involved I didn´t notice it right away when her left leg went down… only when her foot briefly touched my neglected manhood.  
"H-hey… Shichiro… don´t waste too much time on that, i… i´d like to give you my first~" She mewled, softly, under her breath… I was almost afraid I was taking advantage of the girl, that I would use her affections for my own lusts but… I couldn`t deny something was there, thumping inside me. If it was love or instinctive, carnal desire, I didn`t know, but I gave her a nod, moved back up and kissed her…  
It took a few tries, I have to admit, to line myself up at the right angle and slip inside, but it was well worth the effort- Seeing her face distort in extasy, feeling her hot, slippery cavern contract around my length…First I felt something pop, like thin sheet spread out, then ripping- her hymen, most likely-, but then shortly after I grinned as her eyes widened when the tip touched the barrier to her womb, just barely, letting her know just how far I was inside her… the rest was instinct, my hips moved on their own, my mouth giving off grunts and deep huffs as our bodies entangled and lustfully grinded against one another… feeling adventurous, she actually got up on her fours and beckoned me to take her from behind, but I felt her body tense and shiver as soon as I entered, gripping her soft rump with a bit more force, and mere minutes later, she gave off a mewl in a cute voice, her body climaxing around my length.  
…that's when I knew I didn´t have to hold on anymore, and let myself go, filling her with my seed while gently biting her neck like a puppy.

To our greatest fortune, we did dress ourselves properly in time before the rescue party arrived, a truck which loaded the broken rig onto its back, and a few paramedics which looked me over for a few minutes… next to the truck, I could see Tenryuu and Musashi standing by, waiting for me to be released, but I could tell this might take a while so I gestured them over.  
"Hey, you two… nice work out there." While Musashi`s performance had been breathtaking, Tenryuu was the one who deserved more praise- afterall, a light cruiser fighting a standard carrier and winning was not an everyday occurance, but Musashi was built to sink big ships.  
"Yeah yeah, its no big thing." The purple haired one gave back, crossing her arms behind her head. "So, you hurt or something?"  
Musashi said nothing.  
"No, i`m fine. I`ll be going home with you guys as soon as they release me… and after I said goodbye to my sister." I grinned back at them, but Tenryuu only nodded slightly. She seemed a bit… pale, and Musashi kept switching which leg she was resting on, nervously. "…whats with you guys?"  
"We saw your plane fall out of the sky and crash, and nobody could tell us if you were alive or not. This was not only reckless and unnecessary, but quite a grave mistake to make for a leader such as you, Admiral!" Musashi finally spoke up, glancing at me disapprovingly. Uh oh. This was… quite the stern look, even more so than what she used to look like. I suppose she had a point, but…  
"We`re at war, it's not like it's unreasonable to die in battle. …Still, thanks for the concern, I gue-"  
She turned around and left, and Tenryuu watched after her, before shrugging her shoulders with a sigh.  
"Well, there she goes. But oi, didn´t take you for an adrenalin junkie."  
"I have good reasons for doing that, Tenryuu, and I don`t think I'll do it again either." At least not in the near future, because just thinking back to that flight, now that the pills stopped working, made my knees shake. "This was a one-time thing, to help the planegirls get off the ground as a member of the airforce. …Seems like Musashi isn`t going to listen to that, though…"

Saying goodbye was brief, but much more heartfelt than the greeting was. Akiha reached her hand out to me, after a serious scolding for doing things on my own, getting her girls and myself in danger. As I took that hand, though, she let go of her cane for a brief moment to wrap an arm around me, giving an embrace, and quietly, very quietly thanking me for the good work.  
The planegirls saluted in front of me, some of them grinning at the behavior of their commander, Lightning grinning quite knowingly for a whole different reason, and I returned the favor with a promise to them all i´d be visiting again soon.  
How soon, I didn´t know, but I had a feeling this would not be the last time we`d cross paths.  
Compared to this, coming home almost felt cold at first, Bismarck and the others simply stood still and saluted, some of them nervous, while Musashi went off on her own, without saying a word.  
"Welcome home, Kommandant. I see you are well, that is good." Bismarck addressed me, and I nodded in return, dismissing the rest of the fleet.  
"Yes, barely. I had an encounter with the Abyssals, but… I survived, that's the main thing. How is the fleet doing?"  
She swallowed hard, and looked aside. "Well… We are doing good, ja. But… how shall I put this… I may have made a mistake."  
"A mistake? We all make those, Bismarck. No need to worry too much. …what did you do?" I asked her in a calm and gentle voice, resting my hand on her shoulder to make her relax a bit. It didn`t help much, she twitched in response to it.  
"There… there was an option I had not yet seen, called Large Ship Constru-"  
"Oh fucking hell." I groaned, and seconds later, a squeak I had never heard from Musashi before was voiced.  
"Ah-aaahh?!" Looking over to her, I discovered a destroyer popping her head out from underneath her skirt, where she had been… rather interested in what Musashi wore underneath. The grey haired girl had a rather interesting hairstyle, but otherwise seemed like nothing special.  
"Yes! Its me, Battleship Kiyoshimo!" ….Somehow, I felt like going back to Akiha. There was no way that little girl, which barely reached my chest, was a battleship. Still, the way she hugged Musashi`s legs amused me to no end, and the Yamato-class´s efforts to shake her off added to that effect.  
"Is that all, Bismarck? Because honestly, I don`t mind if she`s the result of that LSC. Just going to have to give the fairies a scolding."  
"Ah, well… our resources, they have been… depleted." Bismarck clenched her eyes shut and prepared to be yelled at, and the entire room went silent, but I simply nodded in return. I had expected that sooner or later…. Not this early, and not for that reason, but I made my mind up about it.  
"Okay. Contact the resource division then, and order a stock of thousand units each, i`ll pick out my bank account details for you for the transaction." The german`s face nearly fell apart completely, and Musashi`s glasses dropped off her nose.  
"But… but sir?! That's.. that's YOUR money, for a mistake I made…!" I gave her a smile, tucked the cap off her head and patted her blonde head a few times.  
"So what? Everyone makes mistakes, and I didn`t exactly explain you what that option is… so its my fault too. I don´t need the money I earn from this job, not as much as the fleet does right now. Use it without hesitation."  
Bismarck`s reddened cheeks were briefly tainted with tears, but she wiped them away as quickly as they appeared, and put her cap back on, snatching it away. "Y-yes…" With this, she hurried off without waiting for my dismissal, not wanting to lose her tough act like this.  
In truth, this was an easy decision after the lessons I had learned today… my parents, my grandparents and my brother were gone. But I wasn`t alone… the shipgirls around me, that supported me and depended on me… they could be called a family too. My family. For them, I would gladly spend what I earned from naval command- if they smiled in return, then it was well spent.

Later that day, after I had taken a shower and changed into a new uniform, I was working late in the office- I couldn`t find sleep in this bed of mine, for one reason or another. On the other hand, turning and twisting around for six or seven hours wouldn`t make a whole lot of sense if I would be dead tired the next day either way, so I decided to get up, and get working on some of the paperwork that I would be missing on the next day, when my body gave out and i´d be sleeping on the job.  
I was able to do that for about an hour, before someone decided to come check on me… someone I hadn`t been expecting.  
"Admiral. What are you doing." Musashi asked, raising an eyebrow at me. Her face, despite having hints of anger on it, showed genuine concern.  
"I can`t sleep, Musashi. So I might as well work some more."  
"That's not good for you." Was her response, and her hand pinned mine, which was holding a pen at the moment, down on the table with restrictive force.  
"Didn`t think you`d care. You looked like you were back to hating me when we were rescued earlier." I commented, ignoring her glance about it. "Or did you ever stop hating me in the first place?"  
"I never –started- hating you, Admiral. But when you´re being this unreasonable, reckless and intolerant toward your coworkers, I can´t help but be disappointed in your performance as our leader."  
"I told you I had a reason for doing this." I grunted, looking up at her directly. "The planegirls were about to be disbanded, unless they´d have some military record soon. Akiha wouldn`t have let them move out like this, so I took it upon me to give them something for that record."  
"That wasn`t your job. Your job would have been to motivate their commander, not to jump in a plane with one of them despite having no idea how to fly a plane!" Musashi bellowed back, clutching my hand tighter.  
"Are you lecturing me how to do my job now, or are you just jealous that I was fighting along the planegirls instead of fighting along you?!"  
Her hand was painfully gripping mine now, and I could see her teeth being bared- this was about to escalate, as I could tell…

"…Don´t be ridiculous. You´re our commander. You have no place in the battlefield, but here." Musashi seemed to calm down a bit, letting go of my hand. "As long as you don´t forget that, you`re going to stay alive."  
"…so that was what you were worried about, that I might die." It did make sense in context. Musashi´s military period was late in the war, where kamikaze bombers became common and planes started to sink battleships like her with ease. It was less jealousy, but fear for airplanes that she had.  
"….yes. Yes, I was worried you´d die. And I wasn´t far off, because you crashed in the middle of nowhere."  
"I`m sorry, Musashi." That got her attention. I suddenly apologized, taking her out of the rant she was going on about.  
"What?!"  
"I`m sorry. I should`ve considered how you feel about it. Afterall, I could`ve died, and then this base would be disbanded. I´ll be more careful, more considerate about it next time."  
The tanned battleship stared at me incredulously, rosy cheeks and an open mouth telling me just how much I had caught her off guard. It took several seconds, but eventually she closed her mouth, turned around and began to walk off again.  
"Don`t work for too long."  
"Musashi, wait." I called after her, and stood up. "Wait. Don´t go yet. What did you actually come here for?"  
"This Musashi, you´re confusing her." There she went again, talking in this high and mighty third person speech, looking back over her shoulder at me.  
"You came here for a reason, and not to lecture me like that. What did you want?"  
Caught off guard once more, Musashi blinked, and took a few seconds before she turned back around, looking away from me.  
"….I was going to ask if, since you`re still awake, you`d watch another movie with me."  
A slight grin appeared on my face.  
"Might as well. Its not like i´ll get a lot of work done in this sleepy state."

So in the end of the day, there we were again just like before, sitting in the hobby room together, watching a documentary of the war in the Leyte Gulf from beginning to end. It was the standard stuff, nothing I hadn´t heard of before, with some still pictures of Musashi and Yamato taken from afar, and a few CGI scene showing the battles of them… but a single mention got my attention.  
Prior to her last battle, Musashi was used to transfer the urn containing the ashes of the fallen Admiral Yamamoto to its final resting place.  
…suddenly it all became clear to me why she was so dead scared.  
She already lost someone with my name in the past, and had been close to losing another one…  
The difference was that she never knew my ancestor, but we had spent some time together now, got a bit familiar… I shouldn`t have been so careless. What did I research her history for to make such a dense mistake?!  
Reaching over to her hand, I grasped it gently and held it as that scene passed by, and after some bashfulness passed by, she held mine as well, and we remained like this for the rest of the movie…

…which both of us never saw, because even Musashi fell asleep with how boring it was.


End file.
